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2022 San Francisco Aerial Arts Festival
Zaccho Dance Theatre and the Fort Mason Center for Arts & Culture co-present the 5th biennial San Francisco Aerial Arts Festival as part of FORT MASON ART’s Summer 2022 program. The San Francisco Aerial Arts Festival takes place Friday, August 19, 2022 through Sunday, August 21, 2022.

The city’s premiere aerial arts event, the San Francisco Aerial Arts Festival features internationally recognized artists and exciting newcomers breaking into the field, bringing together spectacle, daring athleticism, aerial dance, and circus.

The 2022 festival will be a dynamic event featuring the RESURGE evening group performance at the Cowell Theater, Youth Revelry Matinee, and the premiere of a new site-specific aerial performance by world renowned choreographer Robert Moses’ KIN at the Festival Pavilion. New for 2022, we are excited to present New Experiments in partnership with CounterPulse - a mixed performance opportunity for aerial artists to come together to build community, share ideas, and present short new works.

UPDATE: The RESURGE performances on Friday 8/19 and Saturday 8/20 will now include an optional pre-show screening at 7:00 pm of the new film Love, a state of grace by Bryan Gibel and Joanna Haigood. All RESURGE ticket holders are invited to attend the film screening with seating beginning at 6:45 pm. The in-person RESURGE performance will still begin at 8:00pm with doors opening at 7:40 pm. The film screening is optional for no extra cost.

Buy your tickets below for these innovative and unique performances today!

RESURGE Performance at Cowell Theater
8:00pm on Friday Aug. 19 & Saturday Aug. 20
7:00pm pre-show screening of film Love, a state of grace Friday Artist Talk Back: Cast of The Rainbow is Enuf
Saturday Artist Talk Back: RESURGE Aerial Artists

Youth Revelry Matinee at Cowell Theater
12:00pm on Saturday Aug. 20

Robert Moses’ KIN at the Festival Pavilion
3:00pm on Saturday Aug. 20 and Sunday Aug. 21
Saturday Panel: Body Sovereignty for BIPOC in Circus & Aerial Artists NEW EXPERIMENTS Showcase at CounterPulse
7:00pm on Sunday Aug. 21

FORT MASON ART is pleased to continue supporting the San Francisco Aerial Arts Festival. The San Francisco Aerial Arts Festival is also generously supported by San Francisco’s Grants for the Arts, San Francisco Arts Commission, National Endowment for the Arts, Gerbode Foundation Special Award in the Arts’ New Choreographer Award, San Francisco’s Dream Keeper Initiative in partnership with the African American Art & Culture Complex, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, Terry Sendgraff Trust, and Zaccho's community of individual donors.
RESURGE Performance at Cowell Theater


The RESURGE performance on Friday and Saturday night at the Cowell Theater will feature 5 works by established aerial choreographers, including the world premiere of choreographer Veronica Blair’s The Rainbow is Enuf, a reimaging of legendary playwright Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow is Enuf, expressed through the lens of modern circus. Also performing are Montreal-born and Bay Area trapeze artist Shannon Gray, international aerialist Pamela Donohoo, Cassandra Cornell and Rachel Karabenick from Las Vegas, and Terry Crane from Acrobatic Conundrum in Seattle.

In addition, RESURGE will screen the short films Love, a state of grace, a new film by Bryan Gibel and Zaccho Dance Theatre’s Joanna Haigood, and The Routes of Vertical Dance: Moon and the Movement by Italian choreographer Wanda Moretti.

On Friday 8/19, this performance will feature the Post-Show Artist Talk Back: The Rainbow is Enuf:

Join us at the edge of the stage for an artist Q&A immediately following the premiere showing of The Rainbow is Enuf with choreographer Veronica Blair and her dynamic ensemble cast – Susan Alston-Voyticky, Toni Cannon, Chloé Farah, Summer Lacy, Copper Santiago, and Darielle Williams.

On Saturday 8/20, this performance will feature the Post-Show Artist Talk Back: RESURGE Artists:

Join us at the edge of the stage for an artist Q&A immediately following the RESURGE group show with choreographers and performers from each of the six pieces – ​​Bay Area trapeze artist Shannon Gray, international aerialist Pamela Donohoo, Cassandra Cornell and Rachel Karabenick from Las Vegas, Terry Crane with Acrobatic Conundrum from Seattle, and Bay Area choreographer and aerialist Veronica Blair.
Youth Revelry Matinee at Cowell Theater


The SFAAF Youth Revelry Matinee on Saturday, August 20th showcases young aerialists from Circus Center’s San Francisco Youth Circus, Kinetic Arts Center's Circus Spire, Mendocino Center for Circus Arts' Circus Mecca, Zaccho Youth Company, and Destiny Arts Youth Performance Company in collaboration with BANDALOOP.
Robert Moses' KIN at Festival Pavilion


Choreographer, writer, and composer Robert Moses joins SFAAF during Robert Moses’ KIN’s 27th anniversary season. This will be Robert Moses’ first foray into aerial performance art with a new installation piece integrating older works with aerial explorations with ropes and harnesses. Moses has created over 100 works of varying styles and genres for his highly praised dance company, as well as composing many of the sound and narrative scores since 2008.

For this new work for SF Aerial Arts Festival, the choreographer offers the following context:

An oral history of God’s disappointment in man’s spiritual decline:

On June 2, 2002, Moses sat down to interview God. This work comes from that conversation and subsequent interviews. But because God is so long-winded that the text and expected resultant book, part of which you’re holding in your hand, has been delayed (to give God a chance to take a breath). So instead Moses has decided to fill the gap between God’s Voice and the time it takes to take a breath with a (for this world at any rate) world premiere dance. Music, text, choreography by Moses… With help from what’s isz name.


On Saturday 8/20, this performance will feature the Post-Show Panel: Body Sovereignty for BIPOC in Circus and Aerial Artists:

Black and brown bodies in aerial and circus movement spaces continue to represent the nuances of race, class, and access in our society. Join us for a conversation with legendary Ringling Brothers artists PaMela Hernandez and Denise Aubrey, acrobatic designer Chloé Farah, choreographer Robert Moses, and facilitated by choreographer Veronica Blair about what it means to take up space and thrive in these unique forms of performance.
New Experiments at CounterPulse


New Experiments is a unique opportunity for aerial artists to come together to build community, share ideas, and present short new works in a mixed program presented in partnership with CounterPulse. In advance of the public performance, artists will participate in an open rehearsal at Zaccho Studio where they can share feedback among fellow participants as well as established dance and aerial choreographers in the field.

Featured artists for 2022 include Ciarra D’Onofrio, Faith Elder, Meléa Emunah, Kelsey Keitges, Meche Perez, and Nina Sawant.