Article 5

Juggler introduces Vietnam’s village life to the world

Le Ngoc Tuan Anh, a world-famous Vietnamese juggler, has significantly contributed to promoting the image of Vietnamese village life to the world through his unique and interesting performances.

Vietnamese juggler, Vietnamese village, puppets

The 37 year-old juggler, known as Tuan Le, was born into an artistic family in Ho Chi Minh City. When he was a child, he developed an interest in circus entertainment and attended a number of shows in the city.

In 1991, his family moved to Berlin, and Tuan Le had to work odd jobs to help out his family. However, with his burning passion for the circus, Tuan Le continued to search for books and materials about the art and eventually secured a position at the Chamaeleon Variete Theater in Berlin.

At 18, Le performed at small nightclubs in Berlin where he continued studying dance, music and circus at the international culture center Ufa Fabrik. A year later, he officially signed a contract with Chamaeleon Variete Theater.

In 2000, Tuan Le performed for the first time at Saint Dennis and began touring France, Sweden, Austria, and the US.

Later in 2009, he signed a long-term contract with Cirque du Soleil and became the first Vietnamese artist working at the Canadian circus. After just one year, he won the Excellence Award from the International Jugglers' Association (IJA).

During his first return visit to his homeland 10 years ago, Tuan Le was completely inspired by the natural beauty of village life in Vietnam. He began to implement an artistic project which combined circus with village story. The “Lang Toi” (My Village) circus project was gradually formed in 2005 after 3 weeks working with Nguyen Lan Maurice, Nhat Ly, and choreographer Tan Loc.

In 2008, a French producer agreed to invest a huge amount of money in Tuan Le’s project.

“Lang toi” deeply impressed foreign spectators with its spectacular moves of strength of young circus performers to the accompaniment of traditional Vietnamese background music.

The circus performance describes Vietnamese folk games, highland fairs and village festivals with professional light art installations and simple props made of bamboo, conical hats, and baskets.

Tuan Le decided to keep the Vietnamese name for his “Lang Toi” work instead of translating into other languages when touring foreign countries.

To date, there have been 400 shows of “Lang Toi” performed in many countries around the world.

In 2013, Tuan Le and his group began to implement “A O Show” which features people's lives in the SouthCentralCoast and the Mekong Delta during the urbanization process.

He plans to bring “A O show" to tour Europe in 2015. “My passion is to build special works so that Vietnamese people can be proud of the unique cultural values of their homeland. I will take advantage of familiar materials in my future works,” says Le.

“Currently, we are working on the third project which combines Vietnamese village image with puppets. I believe that this program will bring new feelings and views about performance art and Vietnamese puppets” to audiences all around the world, he shares.

VOV