(electronic music and industrial sounds) - When it comes to creating these stories through performance, I want the audience to feel inspired to create.

I keep thinking about the times that I watch art and I feel moved.

I feel an impatience.

Yes, I want to appreciate what I'm watching, but I also want to feel that drive to stand up, go somewhere and make something.

And that's what I want to have happen more, is create more art.

(upbeat music) - Michael Dang grew up on the East Coast feeling awkward in his body.

It wasn't until he learned dance, and later the circus arts, that he began to show up authentically as himself.

He is now a skilled performer and producer of the circus arts in Seattle.

Today I'm here at SANCA where he will teach me a few moves on the straps and how to use your body to tell a story.

- Hi.

- Hello.

Hello.

- How are you?

- Pretty good.

How you doin?

- I'm nervous, excited.

I'm ready, I think.

- It's gonna be great.

It's gonna be great.

So we're gonna do some warm-ups and get you sort of ready to go, alright?

- Okay.

- Good.

Just nice and easy.

Chest up and forward.

Chest up and forward.

Yeah.

Find our belly down.

Press and walk.

Press and walk.

Inching forward.

Coming down and walking in.

Breathe.

You know you should be able to sing a song while you do this.

- (laughs) That's a joke.

Okay.

(laughs) - My name is Michael Dang, and I am an aerial instructor, performer, producer, director.

I teach here at SANCA and Emerald City Trapeze Arts, and I'm the founder of Oroki Productions.

Growing up, I felt very self-conscious.

Typical scrawny little Asian kid.

I would get compliments on the fact that you could see my collarbone.

And then I would think about that every day.

It felt not really emasculating, but made me feel powerless.

I would put on an identity that felt more clownish, which, you know, seems more appropriate nowadays since I'm in the circus.

But, yeah, coming to Seattle, I felt a much more connection to not put up a front and just sort of be myself.

When I came to Washington, I saw that there were circus classes.

That thing that you see and you just feel like, "Wow..." "I can do that?"

- What is circus arts?

- Here we sort of separate them into aerial arts, everything that takes you in the air, straps, rope, silks.

And ground arts, like acrobatics, hand balancing.

But there's a lot of disciplines, including even flow arts or learning how to clown.

- When I think about the circus, or at least the history of the circus, I think about a place where people were sort of ridiculed and put on display.

And so I'm wondering how you are sort of reclaiming that narrative or making it something that feels empowering?

- I have a mission to create more circus arts that are about storytelling through your body, and using circus as a medium to tell stories, not just spectacle and death defying feats.

Giving that creative control back to artists and trying to help cultivate those spaces for other performers to tell stories in the way that they want.

(audience cheers and claps) Here we have aerial straps, two little rings here that mimic gymnastics rings.

- Well, let's try it.

- Let's do it.

(laughs) - So put this in.

Up?

- Yup.

And then all the way down.

You're going to lift one knee.

There we go.

And now both legs.

- Oh my gosh.

- Yes!

And shrug.

- (laugh) Yeah right.

- That's okay.

That's okay.

- Ahh!

- Oh that's good!

- Wait I'm jumping first.

- Mhmm.

- Oh!

- Easy.

- (laughs) - Very good.

Try to relax into your arms and into your shoulders.

Bring your knees to your chest.

Okay.

Good.

Look at your knees.

Yes.

See if you can bring your legs straight up.

- Ah!

- Very good.

Very good.

Okay.

Look at your toes.

Excellent.

Good.

Tuck.

And come down.

Very good!

- That's bananas.

- (laughs) - Like what is happening?

(laughs) Oh my gosh!

When you're up there flipping around doing all of your moves, what is that feeling?

What comes over you?

- When it comes to training days, being in the air, I am focusing on the movement quality.

But when it comes to performing, it's about the character and more of an out of body experience where it's just envisioning yourself and how you look and how you feel and what you are trying to say.

There have been moments where I have failed a skill, and it's very obvious, but when you try again on that stage and people see that you're trying again, they're kind of with you.

They're kind of cheering you on to get that next success.

At this point, falling is part of growing, increasing that boundary and finding the edges of yourself.

I feel like the person I am today is someone I couldn't imagine when I was younger.

Okay, so... you will have the ability to do a little flying sequence that just uses what we've learned here today.

I'm going to slightly squat into position, and I'm gonna start walking forward, as I start tucking my legs more and into my shoulders.

- That looks beautiful.

Let's see.

(laughs) - I believe in you.

- Okay.

- Lighter.

Lighter.

A little more squatting.

A little more squatting.

- Ooh.

- Yes.

Yes.

And the moment that you feel consistent, you're just gonna pick up your knees.

Yes.

- Oh, wow.

- Thats fun.

- Natural.

Natural.

- Thats so fun.

- (laughs) (upbeat music) - And fin.

(laughs and claps) I'm so excited.

- Nice work.

- Thank you so much.

- (laughs) - Straps became my way to be free.

They're such a simple apparatus.

It's just you moving your body from hanging.

And through that, I feel both secure and free to find movement and incorporate things that I'm more familiar with.

It just gives me this ability to feel superhuman and to trust in my strength more and trust in my body.