Brisbane’s impressive neo-gothic Anglican cathedral of St John’s played host to this performance of the locally-based Circa’s Eternity, a site-specific commission for the city’s Festival.

Entering the cathedral, the sell-out crowd was invited to circulate around the aisles, ambulatory and presbytery before taking a seat in one of the four-rows of fashion-show style seats that ran the entire length of the nave on either side of a catwalk. As we circulated, performers dressed in angelic white warmed up on plinths arranged around the perimeter of a space beautifully lit by banks of lights, illuminating the performance arena as well as the vaults and arches soaring above.

Circa’s Eternity. Photo supplied

The organ music which had been playing during this prelude gave way to Avo Pärt’s Tabula Rasa and Fratres, which formed the musical accompaniment to the acrobatics of the performers. Pärt’s ‘holy minimalism’ is unlike anything you get in a regular circus act. Allied with the setting, it tells you that Circa is aiming for something far more lofty than the oohs and ahs of the big top.

Tumblers weaved and leapt the length of the catwalk, forming tableaux suggesting a desire...