Plus Petit Cirque du Monde visit

01/02/2023

The CoNECT team visited one of the main project stakeholders' premises in Bagneux, an organisation named the Plus Petit Cirque du Monde (PPCM). PPCM started out as a circus school. Founded in 1992 by Bagneux residents, the PPCM aims to use circus arts to contribute to the vitality of the area. It functions as a circus and urban cultures school, an arts residency, a space for performance and a meeting place.

Today, the PPCM is internationally recognized as a cultural institution: its mission is to mobilize art and culture for the civic, economic and urban development of the local area.

In 2015, a permanent physical venue for PPCM in the form of a 28m-high big top was built by Patrick Bouchain (Grand Prix national d'urbanisme in 2019) and Loïc Julienne. Director Elefterios Kechagioglou showed us around the spaces inside and out.

You can find out more from the project website here: https://www.lepluspetitcirquedumonde.fr/

PPCM collaborates regularly with R-Urban and the Agrocite, running workshops and animations at the space close by.

We also visited another PPCM project in collaboration with La Preuve Par 7 (the 7-fold proof), named the Lycée Avant le Lycée, meaning the School before the School. This project is to activate the future site of a secondary school in Bagneux with design related activities around learning, making the most of the space as a place for experimentation with the aim to continue into the school pedagogy when it is built and running.