Featured Artists – Daniel & Rhiannon Cave Walker
The first ‘Featured Artists’ in this Magazine are Dan & Rhiannon Cave Walker (Fauna), a couple of world class acrobats based in UK and Sweden.
I have known Rhi since she was 8 years old (I was 17!) when we were both in Spaghetti Circus – a great youth circus based in Mullumbimby, NSW which has been running for the last 25+ years.
Over the Summer (here in the southern hemisphere) we collaborated on the little video (and shot the pics) you see in this post over a couple of sessions where I live in Brunswick Heads, Australia. Since we have posted the video, it has been viewed by 100s of thousands of people on Carnival Cinema’s Facebook page which is awesome, exposing these two to circus practitioners all around the world.
So, to give you an insight into the world of this freshly married couple I shot them a bunch of questions and here’s the result:
1. Where are you both from?
Dan – Honiton in Devon southwest England
Rhi – Goonengerry – Byron Bay hinterlands ,Australia
2. How did you get into Circus?
Dan– Trained in Sports acrobatics gymnastics from 7-16 and got into circus through street performing Diablo in a local sea side town folk festival at age 11.
Rhi – Leonie Mills (Spaghetti Circus Founder and absolute legend) Taught circus workshops at my pre-school (Durrumbul) and then mum enrolled me in Spaghetti Circus classes at age 4 
3. How did you meet?
We met in Bristol Uk at a circus festival called Carny-Ville (Invisible Circus). We were both performing there and squatted in an old fire station.
4. You both studied at DOCH. Why choose DOCH?
It was an appealing high level European circus school that merged dance and theatre with circus.
5.Why Handstands? What do you love about them and what drew you to them?
We both where always upside down as kids and did alot of handstands in youth circus and gymnastics. Handstands are a very challenging yet satisfying discipline to learn and train.
Dan – They look unhuman! I like the feeling of training something that looks almost impossible.
Rhi– i love the challenge, its brain training as much as body training and i like the amazement of how the body looks when balancing on one arm.
6. What are your Top 5# Tips on keeping a healthy working relationship when you do an act with your partner?
Still finding that out haha its definitely a challenge
1# being patient with each other
2# not taking things personally
3# separating your training time and home life- trying not to train at home and create a space to do it.
4# take breaks
5# play games
7.How did Fauna (the Company they Co-Founded) form?
The 5 acrobats met at the circus university DOCH in stockholm sweden and wanted to create a show together. We met Geordie our musician years ago street performing at the Edinburgh fringe festival and instantly clicked.
8. Why Start a company as opposed to just sell a duo act?
We do both!
An act is only a short burst of creativity while a full show can consist of more depth, research and dramaturgy.
When working in a group of people there is more artistic potential and its fun and fulfilling to create and travel the world with friends.
9.How often do you train? And can you give a brief description of your training regime.
Our training varies from day to day depending on our location, bodies and emotions. We often have intensive periods of training where we will analyse and break down tricks to progress efficiently. on average we would train 3 hours a day for 5 days of the week for a few weeks at a time. training Consists of stretching, solo handstands, duo hand to hand then play time of flips and being stupid ( a bit of conditioning).
If we’re performing in a show- the warm up and post show period is our training but is more just technique maintenance.
10.Once you leave Circus School, you have to be self disciplined with your training. What drives you to train? And if you find yourself procrastinating, what gets you out of it?
From training so hard at circus school your body tells you that you need to train if you have too long off. It starts to hurt and ache in ways it doesn’t when your in training. The satisfaction of new accomplishments is pretty addictive and is a good motivation.
Doing handstand and hand to hand as a discipline also makes it easy to train virtually anywhere as you don’t have equipment just need a flat-ish surface.
It helps that there is two of us so we can motivate and push each other to train and develop. If we do find ourselves procrastinating sometimes is nice to have a break and ride with it so the enjoyment of training and that crave to move the body comes back naturally.
11. What one peace of advice from a trainer sticks in your head the most?
‘ “The first 10 years is pain… after like holiday'”
– Alexander Gavrilov (Sasha) – handstand teacher at DOCH
12.
A) Rhi, as a flyer – 1. What is the best thing your base can do to make your life easier? 2. What do you NOT want to hear from your them?
1. make me feel safe by catching me and putting me down as softly as possible.
2. your not trying hard enough
B) Dan, as a Base – 1. What is the best thing your flyer can do to make your life easier? 2. What do you NOT want to hear from your them?
1. leave your head in the locker room and train without emotion
2. The over use of words like ‘very’ or ‘alot’, to exaggerate the details of a problem.
13.What inspires you?
Creating new and innovative movement together
14,You’ve just started a company (Fauna) – whats a piece of advice you’d give to others just starting a company?
Dont be afraid to commit and go out of your comfort zone
15. In a group divised show – what are your tips for keeping the creative process flowing and the vibe good in the room?
Have a lot of patience and don’t be afraid to be silly.
16. You travel all the time – what are 3 items each that you ALWAYS take?
Dan – 1.pingpong bats and net 2.chess board 3.skateboard
Rhi – 1. small battery fairy lights 2. apron 3. keepcup
17.What are you each reading at the moment?
Dan – the Gollum chronicles
Rhi – The Name of the Wind- Patrick Rothfuss
18. What else are you into/hobbies besides Circus?
Dan – table tennis
Rhi – cooking & crocheting
19. Where are you based now?
Our company is based in Stockholm.
But we are based mostly in training spaces around the world or our Van in the UK.
20. If you could tour anywhere – where would it be?
Dan – A new colonised planet
Rhi – South America and Madagascar
21. Whats the next for you guys? Dreams?
Touring all over the world with friends and make money from it 
As they are avid Instagrammer’s thats the best place to follow these 2 =
More FAUNA =
I hoped you enjoyed that little insight into Dan & Rhi’s world. Thanks guys for sharing it with us.
Please feel free to share this post and any others on this site (and the site itself) to like minded crew.
Thanks for dropping in,
Peace
Hamish
