Roll up! Roll up! The Great Big Climate Circus kicks off in Stroud

Left: Trashion Fashion workshop (Credit: World Jungle)

Young people from across Gloucestershire will present performance and art projects under the big top of the Great Big Climate Circus at Stratford Park, Stroud on Saturday 20 June from 1 - 6pm. A free public event thanks to the National Lottery, the Great Big Climate Circus is a youth-led creative movement turning young people’s climate concerns into confidence and collective action. Stroud is the first location of the youth-led touring circus, which will also visit Dursley on 11 July and Gloucester on 18 July this summer, as well as different Gloucestershire locations in the future.  
 
The showcase will include a variety of performances by Gloucestershire’s young people including inclusive youth theatre from TwoCan, and aerial trapeze and gymnastics by the School of Larks circus, both from Stroud; street dance and hip-hop from Gloucester’s Your Next Move and the Hip-Hop Garden; and music, rap, spoken word and DJ sets from The Music Works, also from Gloucester. The event will feature music by the county’s emerging artistes including Chaka, Berty Sounds, Arfa J, and the youth rock band, Asphodel.  

The family-friendly event will host free activities for all ages including workshops with Forest Green Rovers Community; sustainable creative crafting with Can't Sit Still, and a circus workshop with the Magnificent Mr. Kai, as well as giant bubbles, arts and crafts, bike maintenance and clothes swap organised by young people. Stroud’s well-known pedal-powered Rinky Dink Sound System and other walkabout artists will be entertaining the public.  

The free event will include climate and community-related stalls so the public can find out more about the work of organisations including Creative Sustainability, Ernest Cook Trust, Bromford Housing, Cotswolds National Landscape, Forest Green Rovers, and more. There will be talks and short films, including photographs, projections and films made by young people reflecting their climate concerns and hopes for the future. 

An upbeat youth-led movement, The Great Big Climate Circus is delivered in partnership by five Gloucestershire organisations: Creative Sustainability, World Jungle, Cotswolds National Landscape, Bromford Flagship, and The Ernest Cook Trust. The project has been awarded £1,498,916 (£1.49 million) over four years from the largest community funder in the UK, the National Lottery Community Fund.  

Since April, The Great Big Climate Circus has been engaging young people through free arts workshops in Stroud, Dursley and Gloucester. As well as rehearsing performances for the showcase, young participants from secondary school age upwards have been co-creating masks, costumes and backdrops from recycled material to decorate the touring big top circus tent. 

The delivery of the Climate Circus workshops and events is by Gloucestershire-based On the Brink Arts and Art for Action with World Jungle.

Ben Ward, director of Dursley-based World Jungle, said: “Rather than using fear or blame, the arts are a brilliant way to engage young people and build confidence. It enables participants to express their thoughts and feelings about the planet and inspire others in practical and positive action.” 

Youth climate action will continue after the summer events, thanks to Stroud-based Creative Sustainability, which will support young people from Gloucestershire to develop their leadership skills as Young Leaders.

Honor Binning, project manager at Creative Sustainability, said: “The golden thread throughout all this work is young people's voices. We have been working with a core group of young leaders to co-produce workshops for these events and future climate action projects. We are excited to see their ideas come to life.” 

This is the first year of the four-year project funded to work across 12 communities in Gloucestershire in different locations. The Great Big Climate Circus aims to engage around 6,000 people, with 720 young people involved in co-creating events and 120 young people supported to go on to further climate action locally or nationally.