- On this edition of ARTEFFECTS.

Dive into the world of "flow arts" with four Reno-based stories featuring Cooper Bayt.

- I would describe "flow arts" fire spinning as a visual art and you're able to tell a story and create shapes that you wouldn't be able to otherwise with just your body.

- [Beth] Acro Enso.

- [Cyrus] We like to think about creative discovery in ways that we can allow people to explore movement, explore themselves.

- [Beth] "Corteo".

- [Participant] The lights play a very key point in the safety reference for the artist.

They're used to seeing a beam at a certain angle.

- [Beth] And Moderngram.

- [Participant] In a dance film, you're right there where they're breathing or looking at you and you can see the color of their eyes.

- Its all ahead on this edition of ARTEFFECTS.

(upbeat instrumental music) (upbeat instrumental music) - [Narrator] Funding for artifacts is made possible by Sandy Raffealli with Bill Pierce Motors.

Meg and Dillard Myers.

In memory of Sue McDowell.

The Carol Franc Buck Foundation.

Chris and Parky May and by the annual contributions of PBS Reno members.

- Hello, I'm Beth Macmillan and welcome to ARTEFFECS.

In this episode you will meet several artists who elevate the arts and culture scene in northern Nevada to a new level and in some cases to extreme heights.

The four stories you're about to see share the same theme of "flow arts".

"Flow arts" is a term used to describe the intersection of a variety of movement-based disciplines including dance, circus, hooping, and fire-spinning.

"Flow arts" includes a variety of pursuits that harmonize skill-based techniques with creative expression to achieve a state of present-moment awareness known as "flow".

In the first of many stories featuring "flow arts", we introduce you to Cooper Bayt.

This Reno-man combines "flow arts" with fire.

Through his craft he creates a mesmerizing experience for both his audience and for himself.

(upbeat instrumental music) - I would describe "flow arts" as a visual art, much like dance, but you're combining modern dance with prop manipulation, so it's adding that extra element where it's kind of an extension of your body and you're able to tell a story and create shapes.

(upbeat instrumental music) My name's Cooper Bayt and I'm from Reno, Nevada.

I am a flow artist and professional fire spinner.

I was gifted a pair of juggling sticks when I was really young and I spent countless hours at the park training this thing that I had no idea would really kinda take over my life later on.

"Controlled Burn", which is a local fire spinning group, had a workshop when I was only 13 years old and so I was able to fire spin for the first time when I was 13.

And my grandma, she was a professional photographer, she actually captured that first time.

She instilled a lot of that fine arts background in me and to be dynamic.

The first step to creating a fire show is to make sure that the area is safe in case anything happens, any drops, nothing's gonna spark up.

Secondary, set the space with candles, with torches on the ground in order to create the stage effect.

Third, almost most importantly is that I'm gonna have a duvetyne blanket, it's a fire safe blanket and a spotter that's gonna be right there for me to help me put out my props in order for me to start the next one and keep everything in a calm, collected manner, tell me if I catch on fire or if anything goes wrong.

(upbeat instrumental music) There are specialized tools, like a juggling club.

And the way you would do it is you would have, let's say a jar or a ammo container full of white gas, kerosene or lamp oil and you actually dip it in and this wick will absorb like a sponge.

When you dip the prop into the gas, that's like a moment of mindfulness, like you're counting, you're measuring the amount of fuel that you soak and you hold it there and you let the excess drip out.

And in that moment you know you're collecting yourself, you're getting ready, and when you're ignite it, that poof, that initial rush is like, okay, here we go.

Everything just starts to fade away.

You just get that internal rush of the fire around your body, the sound of it, whooshing past your head.

It's an amazing feeling.

I love to interpret like hip hop dance with creating shapes that are extensions of my bodies with the props.

So it's kind of that mix of dance and prop manipulation very much inspired by hip hop and modern dance.

A lot of it is improvisational when it's just a solo-flow performance.

I do also choreograph and write shows with multiple fire artists, so it becomes a choreographed dance that is very structured that we all have to hit the certain notes on the certain eight counts in order to create the illusion, create the shape that we want the audience to see.

What I get out of "flow arts", juggling, fire spinning is the fact that it's good, it's good for my mental health.

It's not so easy to talk about mental health and people's anxiety and fear and I think this has been a means that has really, really saved me in a way to be able to dance like nobody's watching.

And you really can get into a meditative state.

It's the "flow state" that we refer to and it's mindfulness because you're able to move your body in a certain way that you're able to release, you're able to let go of everything else and train relentlessly to give me some kind of purpose in this crazy world.

Like even if it's just as silly as learning a new trick that night, it's doing the problem solving, the going through the motions and the failure in order to pick it back up and and start again.

And so that translates into my life tenfold.

(upbeat instrumental music) - To learn more about Cooper Bayt, you can find him on Instagram, @cooperbayt.

Up next, we take you to a large scale movement studio in the heart of downtown Reno.

This unique space is called Acro Enso.

Here these artists swing from silks, balance on each other's shoulders and spin around in large wheels.

As you're about to see, the space is large enough to allow artists of all ages and abilities to move and play.

(upbeat instrumental music) - We like to think about creative discovery and ways that we can allow people to explore movement, explore themselves, and create and also have fun.

Acro Enso is perhaps the only place in Reno and one of the few places in the United States where we have a very particular focus and program based around Cyr wheel and partner acrobatics and where we incorporate a variety of other circus arts.

- The name Acro Enso came to us after a long journey of asking many friends and family about what we should call this place.

- We knew that we really wanted to focus on partner acrobatics and Cyr wheel, and so we wanted acrobatics to be a part of the name.

We also wanted something referencing a Cyr wheel, so in this case a circle.

- And so it's actually Japanese calligraphy practice that they do, it's circle and when they draw the circle, it's always incomplete and it's supposed to symbolize that whoever draws the circle, they are perfect and imperfect in that moment and it's wonderful as is.

They're completely present and this moment's never gonna last forever.

It's gonna always be changing and that's kind of how I feel about acrobatics.

When I'm flying in the air or when I'm holding somebody up, It's present, it's in the moment.

There's nothing else in the world that matters.

It's perfect, it's imperfect, and it's me.

To us, Acro means meaningful play and Enso means authentic movement in whatever form that is.

So all put together, Acro Enso is meaningful play through authentic movement.

(upbeat instrumental music) Cyr wheel is a giant metal wheel covered in PVC.

What you do with it is you get inside of it, you spin around in it, you play with it.

- A lot of what we do in the Cyr wheel is learning how to stand and how to root ourselves into our feet.

And so there are actually a lot of similarities between learning Cyr wheel and learning ballet.

In Cyr wheel, it's all about rotation and understanding where your center is and being able to create a really nice spinning axis with our body.

And so a lot of what we do in the Cyr wheel is we initiate rotation and then we stand into it and from there it's this really cool process of, I like to talk about kind of developing a spider sense.

You can't really use your eyes because you're spinning.

You really have to develop this intuitive sense of where your center of gravity is, where it's going and how to interact with that.

And it's a really fun process.

(upbeat instrumental music) - Word Acro is where you have partnerships either groups of two, groups of three or more, and you come together and you lift each other up, you balance each other, you throw each other in the air, flip around and catch each other and it's a whole competitive sport on its own.

We do compete with our sports team, but we also have an adults team where we focus on performance for the kids as well.

We like to have that performance opportunity so that we can have them go to places like GSR and perform in CMS and do fun acrobatics.

Our acrobatics teams will train for about two hours per training and in that two hours they go through a variety of conditioning drills, handstand drills, partner skills, and at the end of practice we focus primarily on choreography and linking all of those skills together.

(upbeat instrumental music) Our son's name is Huckleberry and our daughter's name is Coco.

Family is everything to us.

We wanted to create a place that our children could come to and be able to grow inside of and someday even take over if that's something that they're interested in.

So our kids are here all the time.

They are taken care of by the village of this community.

- When Huckleberry is wandering around, he's got all sorts of people interacting with him, playing with him, teaching him, and same thing with Coco and just watching how they've blossomed and how they've come up in it.

Obviously as parents and we don't want to project onto them, but we do want to provide opportunities and so being, having the ability to provide those opportunities and to watch them take them up enthusiastically has just been amazing.

(upbeat instrumental music) - [Keisha] When we started this place and we had only one or two people coming in and our acro team only had five kids on it, it felt like a lot.

It felt like we had a long journey ahead of us.

- Especially with what we've had to go through.

We were just about to celebrate our first year anniversary when Covid happened.

The number of times that we thought we would have to close this place were, you know, more than we can count.

- Now when I come into this space and I can see the floor filled with people and our team of 18 kids, everybody playing with each other and having fun with each other, it is an overwhelming feeling that just puts a big smile on my face.

- A really big feeling of wonder almost, that it could happen.

- It creates a kind of life that I don't think I would wanna live without.

- To learn more, visit acroenso.com.

Since the 1980s, "Cirque de Soleil" has brought jaw dropping circus arts to stages across the world through stunning visual spectacles and the imaginations of many eclectic artists.

In 2019, the "Cirque du Soleil" show "Corteo" stopped right here in Reno.

Audiences at the Lawlor Events Center were treated to dancers on chandeliers, acrobats, clowns, and other memorable characters who collectively told a memorable story.

Let's take you behind the scenes to see how "Corteo" came to life.

(audience cheering) - And now, we invite you into the world of "Corteo"!

- Corteo means cortege or procession, comes from Italian, because the show tells a story of a clown who is dreaming about his own funeral, but in a carnival atmosphere.

You're gonna see his friends from all over the world in different circuses coming to see him, show all their amazing skills they have.

- [Jeffrey] It's the telling of his loves and triumphs and faults all while the audience is being a part of it the whole time.

They get to sit and feel like they're on stage with him as he goes through these memories in his mind.

- [Maxwell] Even though the main theme of the show is his own funeral, the show is a celebration of life.

- Ladies and gentlemen welcome to the-- - It takes us about a 12 hour day to set the show up from an empty floor to ready to go for the artist to arrive.

The first nine hours of that is us getting the set actually built, installed, and everything cabled and the last three hours for the lighting department and the sound department is checking everything in a dark room.

- They're going through each act of the show, every single moment of the show, they need to go through it and making sure that we have the lights in the right position, in the right color as well, so they're checking the lighting.

We have the rigging team also checking everything that we use to make our performance fly.

Not only the performance, but also flying apparatuses.

We have the automation team making sure that everything that moves on stage on the floor in the air, is also in place.

- [Jeffrey] The lights play a very key point in the safety reference for the artists.

They're used to seeing a beam at a certain angle and a certain part of the set lit up.

That's where they know where they're at in a roll or a tumble and they can always stop right on the same spot because they know the edge of the light is where it is.

But it's a subtle thing we can play to help them be safer.

- [Maxwell] This show is very unique from any other "Cirque du Soleil" production because of the way this stage is set up, it's right in the middle of the arena and the audience is sitting on both sides of it.

This way, when you're watching the show, you see something extraordinary happening on stage and the reaction of people on the other side of the stage, you have the feeling of the actors so you know, how does it feel to be on stage and how do you see the reaction of people when they see something amazing happening in front of you?

(crowd cheering) - You do have to change the way you perform.

You have to be a performer at every angle.

That was something that took a little getting used to, like I've been in other shows, but I've never been in a show where I'm being watched from every single angle.

There's moments where you, you feel like nobody's missing a trick and if you make a mistake or something, you feel right in the middle of everyone's eye line.

(drums beating) - The creator of the show, Daniele Finzi Pasca, he wanted the technicians who also have some visibility because they're as importance as our performance as well.

They're part of the show as well.

So by the end of the show, all the performers, they'll look back to the center of the stage and all the technicians they'll run and cross, they do a high five with each other from one side to the other.

It's a very small moment that they are being part of the show somehow.

But it's beautiful to see that our director recognizes the hard work, not only from people on stage but also off stage as well.

- [Jeffrey] We're here to set the mood and help subtly influence people into completely leaving the world they're in, and remember they're not in an arena and feel like they've moved into wherever he is at any point, whether it's the warmth in the air or just a subtle little sound coming outta a speaker behind them, it's enough to just take them away to another world.

There is an amazing sound that comes out of almost every audience at some point during the show, which is just you hear them collectively all gasp at the same time and it's the most spine tingling moment for somebody running the show because you know you've made an impact.

- It's too much, I'm already dead.

- The only time our job titles matter is when the show's actually running.

- We have 52 performers from 18 different nationalities.

They come from the most different backgrounds.

We have musicians, we have singers, actors, dancers, people coming from gymnastics, circus school, so it's a very mixed group.

- [Jeffrey] We're about 110 people on the road together and when the show finishes at the end of the night, we're eating the same catering.

We're living in the same venues.

We travel together on the same plane or bus.

- And seeing these people from so many different places working together and be able to put this beautiful piece of "Corteo" on stage every week, this is definitely one of the best things that we could have.

- When the show is over we are 110 family members.

We're there for each other, we support each other.

If you're having a bad day, somebody's gonna be there to support you, and if you're having an amazing day, you've got this 109 troop behind you that wants to celebrate your accomplishments with you.

- "Corteo" is still touring throughout the United States and throughout the world.

To learn more, visit citquedusoleil.com/corteo.

Dance and film are two methods that people use to express themselves.

Our final "flow arts" segment features artists who use both.

In 2018, we met the duo behind Moderngram.

They collaborated with artists all over the Reno area creating dance films to bring you into their world.

(upbeat instrumental music) - So, Moderngram is something I started with Shaila Emerson, and it is a collaborative group of people and artists that I've found and love, that I consider family, that we do different dance for camera projects.

- I met Erica a few years ago.

We just started talking about dance because we both had that connection and then she was like, I'd love to do some dance films if you ever would want to.

It completely piqued my interest, obviously, but we made our first dance film together.

It was called "Ravendoe".

It was more of just an idea from what we were both going through at that time.

It was really spur of the moment.

We planned it in a week and we just went out into the woods and dressed up as animals.

It ended up being like super inspirational to continuing doing dance films together.

(soft instrumental music) (intense instrumental music) - A dance film is cinematography catered towards choreography or choreography for cinematography.

So you would approach how you would film something differently than you would like a short film or like acting or a narrative, because it's movement based.

The videography would be used to help shift what the audience can then be looking at.

So it gives the choreographer or the producer more control over what their intention is and what they're trying to communicate.

(upbeat instrumental music) The camera gets to move with the dancer and in in a way, get in their face, get in their movement, and then you can see more of the details of what's going on.

Things that are smaller that humans can or the audience can relate to.

- At a performance you can only see them so far, in a dance film you're right there where they're breathing or looking at you and you can see the color of their eyes.

And this way we're able to add music and sound effects and different kinds of shots that are very intimate and it describes dance and storytelling in a different way.

(upbeat instrumental music) (upbeat instrumental music continues) My inspiration for anything that I do that's creative comes from a deep seated desire to unearth things that are stuck inside that I don't know how to process or talk about.

And then the concept of moving past those things.

What is the strength involved in that challenge that I can find in my body and in myself?

I mean, that's what art is, you know, you express the inexpressible.

- We have a lot of oxymoron ideas in, or conflicting ideas in our dance films.

Visually, I think it comes from the moment.

It's very spontaneous and most of our stuff isn't really planned out, so it's just kind of fun to bounce ideas off of one another when we're like working through our personal emotional things and just our life and kind of adding that into the dance films, I think it just helps bring out like raw emotion within the dance film.

(suspenseful instrumental music) (suspenseful instrumental music continues) (singing) - I really enjoy leading or guiding another dancer through movement while she or he is being filmed and that I get to be the one kind of helping them flow through the movement and helping them find what's honest in their movement and what's beautiful or real.

For Shaila, she has to be very much in tune with how the movers are moving, and a lot of the times with some of the locations that we're in, they can't stick with the choreography.

They have to improvise, she doesn't know what's coming next.

- Being a dancer and shooting dance, it's just like a whole new level.

I take the camera and I dance with the dancer, and so it's almost like for the viewer, you get to be dancing with the dancer and it's like a whole new emotion that you get to experience within the dance film.

(upbeat instrumental music) - I think what I want people to take away from what they watch is that they can relate in some way to what I've created or get something out of it, even if my intension is not the same as what they interpret.

It's just a way to connect us all, especially when so many things in life can be chaotic and unrelatable.

I love that ability to connect with people through something like that and to just share.

And I think vulnerability is one of the most valuable things as humans as far as connecting each other.

(upbeat instrumental music) - To watch more dance videos from Moderngram, check out their YouTube channel under their new name @movgramdance.

And that wraps it up for this edition of ARTEFFECTS.

If you wanna watch new ARTEFFECTS segments early, make sure you subscribe to the PBS Reno YouTube channel and don't forget to keep visiting pbsreno.org to watch complete episodes of ARTEFFECTS.

Until next week, I'm Beth Macmillan.

Thanks for watching.

- [Narrator] Funding for ARTEFFECTS is made possible by Sandy Raffealli with Bill Pierce Motors.

Meg and Dillard Myers.

In memory of Sue McDowell.

The Carol Franc Buck Foundation.

Chris and Parky May and by the annual contributions of PBS Reno members.

(upbeat instrumental music) (upbeat instrumental music continues) (upbeat instrumental music fades)