Is the man seducing the woman? Is she resisting? Compagnia Rasoterra use brutal physical acrobatics in their act to investigate subtle forms of sexual violence Photograph: Phil Fisk
Corporate team building with circus skills make a very different proposition to the familiar ‘trust your partner’ exercises Photograph: Phil Fisk
“This was originally supposed to be a three-man tower. Due to injury we ended up with two and I like it better. It’s subtler, you get the double-take effect.” Photograph: Phil Fisk
Fisk photographed Alana the reclining tightrope walker in the Roundhouse’s back yard using a rigger, a cherry picker and four tonnes of water Photograph: Phil Fisk
Inspired by news stories about stowaways, trapeze artists swing freely through a storage container depot in Dagenham Photograph: Phil Fisk
The “old man” is 25-year-old Chinese-pole acrobat Conor Neall, who spent three-and-a-half hours in makeup to achieve the effect Photograph: Phil Fisk
“She’s really coming out of the drum. We originally shot Lula Loop through the window on the machine door but you couldn’t see enough of her to identify what she was.” Photograph: Phil Fisk
“Pastiches student posters of posh French films, pretty girls sat on handlebars. We reversed that, pushed the danger, and shot it on the Heygate estate in Elephant and Castle.” Photograph: Phil Fisk
“They were a more traditional troupe. I had them enacting real hostility, but they wouldn’t stop smiling, all the way through.” Photograph: Phil Fisk
A contemporary nod to Jeff Wall’s ‘A Sudden Gust Of Wind’, itself based on a 19th-century woodblock print by Japanese artist Hokusai Photograph: Phil Fisk
