Wānaka Festival of Colour has announced its headline act for the 2025 festival: Cirque Alfonse’s latest work Animal.

Festival artistic director Sophie Kelly said the festival was delighted to be able to share the Cirque Alfonse act with local audiences.

“In just 20 years, this rural raised collective has toured the biggest cities in the world with its truly authentic circus style and we are lucky that they will be joining us for two special performances in the Lake Wānaka Centre next year,” Sophie said.

Founded in 2005 by Antoine Carabinier-Lépine and his father Alain, Cirque Alfonse is an intergenerational circus which hails from the little town of Saint-Alphonse-Rodriguez, Québec.

Cirque Alfonse, which is known for its high-flying antics and infectious energy, has created in Animal a surreal circus experience set to an infectious live soundtrack of ‘agricultural funk’.

Audiences should expect jaw-dropping acrobatics, daring juggling (everything from eggs to giant cowbells), tap dancing, absurd humour and even a tractor doing wheelies, Sophie said.

The cows kick up more than just dirt in Cirque Alfonse’s Animal. PHOTO: Benoit Z Leroux

Animal is billed as a production for young and old alike, where the farm has gone haywire: the performers flip farm life on its head – and the barn upside down. The chickens sprout teeth, the ducks give side-eye and the cows kick up more than just dirt. 

Animal will be the headline act for the Wānaka Festival of Colour 2025 that runs from March 29 to April 6, 2025. 

The production is supported by Wānaka Festival of Colour’s naming rights sponsor, Milford Asset Management. The creation and touring of Animal was made possible by the financial support of the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec and the Canada Council for the Arts.

Public ticket sales begin on November 15.

PHOTOS: Supplied