Clifford

Clifford and Miranda (see photo #4) are a husband and wife team of circus performers. They were originally animal trainers, but when this became unfashionable because of improved animal welfare laws, they pivoted to becoming mime artists. To start with, they were aerial mime performers, imitating all sorts of flying animals when on the trapeze, but when this became untenable because of increasingly strict health and safety laws, they pivoted one last time to land-based mime. Perhaps because of their past experience with changing regulatory standards, they specialise now in “health and safety mime,” an obscure genre that involves standard mime routines with the added dimension of realistically portraying what happens when there is a “mime fail.” For example, with no other tools than his Marcel Marceau inspired outfit and black gloves, Clifford is an expert at miming the construction of a brick wall, while Miranda realistically reflects what happens when that wall collapses through misadventure or poor adherence to building standards on an unsuspecting mime graffiti artist. Other acts involve mishaps when miming the chopping down of trees in a forest when there is no one else around (or so they thought), or ghastly accidents when miming with invisible ropes.

Clifford is also an articulated ceramic wall puppet and he is modelled by hand in stoneware clay, twice fired, decorated with ceramic glazes, and finished with a cold glaze. He is approximately 32 cm long, and can hang on the wall by nail, hook or tack.