Team

In 2014, Roman Müller had the novel idea to launch a festival for contemporary circus in the “Alten Reithalle in Aarau“. Only one year later cirqu’ was a reality. As artistic director, he works full time for the festival and is known to impress with his new, somewhat crazy creative ideas.

Roman – a juggler by trade – has lived the circus for 20 years. With his company Tr'espace, which he founded in 2002, he performs worldwide and has been awarded numerous international prizes. He was a juror of the European CircusNext Edition 2015/16 and a ProCirque board member.

Madlaina Bundi-Alder has been on board since the start and as a true blue Aarauer provides us with a special connection to the city. She not only maintains the finances at cirqu', she is also responsible for management and media-marketing.

Madlaina has both a bachelor’s degree in Sociology and Communications, and a Master's in Comparative Media Studies both from the University of Lucerne. In 2014, she completed her further education at the Stapferhaus Lenzburg, specializing as a cultural manager. Since then she is involved in a variety of cultural projects, but has mainly devoted herself to cirqu'.

Laura Olgiati has been with us from the beginning and is an integral part of the Festival team. Not only is she involved as a producer, but she also supports the entire festival with her in depth knowledge of the European contemporary circus scene.

Laura studied international relations in Geneva before starting and completing training as a cultural manager in London. She has worked for the Kaserne Basel, the Basel Theatre Festival and the Wildwuchs Festival. Between 2013 and 2017, she worked in London at Crying Out Loud, a leading contemporary circus production office in the British and European cultural scene. Today, she is cirqu’s only producer, and is co-managing other cirqu’ projects together with Roman.

Alongside Nik Friedli, Edith Szabò is the technical director for cirqu’ and is the point of contact for all technical matters.

Since 1994, Edith has worked as light designer, stage technician and technical director at Theater Tuchlaube and Theater Marie. At the moment, she is a freelance technician for theatre, dance, circus and variété shows.

Alongside Edith Szabò, Niklaus Friedli is the technical director for cirqu’ and is the point of contact for all technical matters.

Niklaus trained as a sound engineer (SAE) in Zurich, successfully completing the basic and specialist event technology courses SVTB. Niklaus also completed the basic and specialist course for assessment and achieved the title "Event Specialist EFZ." Between 2007-2018 he worked at the Tuchlaube Theater, first as a theatre technician and then, after being promoted, as technical director. Between 2013-2017 he was also the scenographer & co-director at the company Jungen Marie. Over the last years, he has also worked on stage, light and sound concepts for various freelance groups.

Since joining cirqu’6 in 2017, Hannes Flück has become a valuable member of the core cirqu’ team and is responsible for the important team of volunteers. He brings with him a flair for organization and the ability to gather and motivate volunteers. He isn't new to the circus: His enthusiasm and fascination with contemporary circus is based on his own experiences in an amateur circus.

Since a very young age, Hannes has shown an interest in archaeology: He studied prehistory and early history, medieval archaeology and ethnology at the University of Basel from 1997-2004 and has been working for various cantonal archaeological projects in Switzerland since graduation. Between 2009-2015 he returned to the University of Basel as an assistant and doctoral student in provincial Roman archaeology. He completed his PHD in 2017.

Ute Classen is a very important advisor for cirqu’. She is an experienced theatre producer and is specialized in contemporary circus, the development of which she has followed meticulously over the past 25 years.

She acts as an interface between artists and organizers and has in depth knowledge of both fields. She not only handles activities as producer but she also acts as a program scout for theatres and festivals. Aided by her extensive network of international contacts, she provides strategic support for artists in administration, production and tour planning.
At cirqu' she is a behind the scenes advisor for many things as well as the contact person for questions and projects requiring international cooperation.