Based on my experience at the Maison des Jonglages, located in Bondy in the Paris suburbs, I aim to reflect on the challenges of establishing a cultural center dedicated to circus and street arts on the urban periphery. I will begin by exploring more broadly the dynamics between center and periphery.

From nomadic hunter-gatherer camps to the vast aggregations known as metropolitan archipelagos, the notions of center and periphery are frequently used to analyze the structuring of human societies. These conceptual tools, widely disseminated since the 20th century, not only describe reality but also become compelling visual models - collective mental images that actively contribute to the construction of urban realities. An intuition, grounded in objective realities and lived experience, leads us to view the relations between center and periphery as shaped by domination and inequality. Through its cultural practices, lifestyle, and symbolic values, the center exerts strong attractiveness. The political and economic support it receives further enhances its reach and influence.

However, historical, cultural and geographical realities are diverse, and shifting patterns of polarization regularly move zones of influence and power from one space to another. Moreover, globalization and digital revolutions reshuffle the cards, allowing multiple points to become centers - particular, atypical, or unique. In the 21st century, the tensions between local and global, real and virtual, have become intrinsic to human activities, and cultural projects are equally affected by these structuring antagonisms.

Traditionally centralized, France began a process of decentralization in the 20th century, delegating powers and responsibilities to complex administrative subdivisions. Developing a cultural space on the periphery aligns with these decentralization policies but still faces the real and symbolic power of one or more centers. The dominant culture of the centers continues to influence the peripheries, while cultures emerging at the margins oscillate between becoming a new center or asserting their own identity, beyond the dominant/dependent divide.

So, on the periphery, should one dream of becoming the center instead of the center?

Let us make a slight semantic shift from the word “periphery” to the notion of “margin”. The margin simultaneously evokes minority, otherness, and exclusion, as well as distance and difference. Acting from the margin often means inventing one’s own identity, creating the conditions for the emergence of the new, and perhaps freeing oneself from preexisting structures of domination. Theoretical in appearance, this approach lays philosophical, moral, and political foundations for a cultural project in the suburbs.

Concretely, let us observe the visible parts of the iceberg. We believe that a cultural center on the periphery must adopt an active stance of decentering. In the face of ideological, socio-economic, and cultural divides, it is essential to work closely with local residents. Beyond the physical venue, actions unfold in a rhizomatic manner across the territory, where circus and street arts - playful and intergenerational - enable inhabitants to more easily reclaim spaces and activities.

We build collaborations with local organizations: community centers, nurseries, schools, libraries, sports associations, social and medical structures, justice-involved populations, and more. I also believe that transdisciplinarity is essential to bring circus and street arts to unexpected places. Crossing paths with aesthetics favored by youth, urban arts, or digital media facilitates encounters, surprises local audiences, and energizes the disciplinary field (juggling and slam, freestyle football and hip-hop, flair bartending in hospitality schools, juggling automata in technical high schools, circus and health projects, etc.).

Beyond its cultural and artistic activities across the territory, the Maison des Jonglages programs performances, notably through the Festival Rencontre des Jonglages. Close engagement with local residents encourages participation: the event feels familiar to them because they have internalized its aesthetic logic and meaning. By programming and presenting high-quality works, the festival also attracts more gentrified audiences seeking an ‘adventure’ in the suburbs. The festival is also built through co-productions with around fifteen partners located in the periphery or in Paris. This synergy supports a form of decentralization in which the center becomes just one node among others in a rhizome, whose gravitational focus is anchored in the suburbs.

In summary, several elements seem crucial for a viable cultural project on the periphery: Practicing the art of decentering - Playing with symbolic and territorial scales of value - Surprising policymakers by altering the usual flows between periphery and center - Forging stimulating collaborations - Maintaining the conviction that culture is essential, even when basic needs remain largely unmet.

Aware of the multipolarization of the world and the limits of an overly Eurocentric or culture-centered perspective, how can we better conceive and practice decentering than by developing cultural projects whose identity is built at the margins of the heart of our societies?

Photo: © Tomas Amorim.

Vincent Berhault

Auhor, stage director, performer and director of the “Scène Conventionnée” (label from the French Ministry of Culture) Maison des Jonglages, Vincent Berhault has been working in the field of contemporary circus for the last 25 years. As founder and artistic director of the Company Les Singuliers, he has led the production and creation of numerous projects in France and abroad. Originally trained as a juggler, he has worked on pieces where body, object, music and text are intimately linked. Graduated in anthropology and international relations, he initiated transnational creative projects, particularly with Turkey. In 2017 he directed the play Entre dealing with exile and borders. He also pursues researches around art and sciences devices and considers these exchanges as a stimulation for creativity in the arts. And it is in this context that he has been, since 2019, an associated artist at the Iremam laboratory (Institute for Research and Studies on the Arab and Muslim Worlds). By putting his various skills at the service of the Maison des Jonglages, he works to promote and develop this unique project in Europe and supports a transversal approach where juggling mixes with other artistic expressions as well as sports and sciences. Vincent Berhault is also co-president of the professional network Territoires de Cirque.