Justine Berthillot

From a very young age she practised gymnastics, and continued to do so for some ten years, during which she discovered a taste for surpassing herself and, above all, the joys of movement. As a teenager, a creative need also began to make itself known, expressed first through dance, drawing and art, which she practised for four years. But in 2006, due to a need to seek out bodily and acrobatic sensations in a freer and more personal way, she knocked on the door of the amateur circus school in Bourg-en-Bresse. Now here she is, on her hands of course, except that for the first time she is offering herself into other hands. Instinctively and in tune with a strong emotion, she has a feeling that it may go hand-in-hand. Like a new challenge: allowing herself to be carried, let go and fully experience body-to-body contact. So, for three years she practised circus arts and contemporary dance while passionately pursuing philosophy studies at preparatory school. Then, after obtaining her degree, she decided to dedicate herself professionally to the circus and train as an acrobat.  Her fondness for questioning means a need to test herself physically, to search with her body. In 2009 she then joined the ENACR and it was meeting Frédéri Vernier that marked the crucial moment in her journey, the real start of it. A duo ever since, in 2011 they joined the Centre National des Arts du Cirque (CNAC). Upon leaving the school, she performed in Tetrakaï by Christophe Huysman and realised her first choreography project with Frédéri Vernier. It has now been five years that they have not left one another’s side, whatever happens.