Inspired By Lewie West
He’s from Australia. You’ve probably seen him around on Youtube, balancing on his hands or diving almost impossible dives straight into the floor: Yes, I’m talking about Lewie West. The hand balancing Youtube celebrity.
Lewis West
Born and lived in Australia his whole life, although now he spends more time touring overseas than I do in Australia.
Graduated high school and college and then received a Bachelor of Circus Arts from the National Institue of Circus Arts (NICA) in MelbourneEnsemble member in the Brisbane-based contemporary circus company “Circa” (circa.org.au)
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What Training background do you have?
I Moved between gymnastics, trampolining, youth circus and breakdancing before investing all my energy in to circus.
When, why and how?
When I was young, about 8, and did gymnastics we were made to do handstands and I never liked them. They were hard and boring and one of the reasons I quit was because doing prolonged handstands against a wall was one of the worst parts of my week. I never really did them again until I saw some people b-boying in my high school and thought it looked like fun. The handstands breakdancers did were completely different to what I was used to. More one-armed work, more dynamic and interesting and I really like the challenge of the strength and balance and flexibility. It was so much more ‘alive’ than gymnastics handstands.
Itrained in my lounge room and in the school gymnasium and even on the log barricades we had around the school just doing little bits here and there. Then I found out about circus. The first handbalance routine I ever saw was Samuel Tetreault’s act in the Cirque du Soleil series Solstrum. You can see it here
I had no idea that it was possible to be that controlled and strong on one-arm. So one thing lead to another and I went to the Circus School in Melbourne and specialised in a handbalancing/tumbling combination and an aerial apparatus called straps. I trained at NICA for three years before graduating and joining Circa.
Technical skill is mastery of complexity, while creativity is mastery of simplicity.” – Erik Christopher Zeeman
What training did you do?
When I was at circus school I used to come in an hour or an hour and a half early to just work on handstands by myself. The most important thing I’ve found about training handstands is there’s no cheating or shortcuts. You have to spend time upside down if you want to get better. I had a Chinese trainer called Jing-Jing Xue who was “Mister Handstand” in China. I can’t find any footage of him on the internet but I have seen his acts and they are incredible. He used to train 8 hours a day just on handstands and would be so exhausted that he couldn’t hold his chopsticks to eat at night.
Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination. Devour old films, new films, music, books, paintings, photographs, poems, dreams, random conversations, architecture, bridges, street signs, trees, clouds, bodies of water, light and shadows. Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this your work (and theft) will be authentic.Authenticity is invaluable; originality is non-existent.
And don’t bother concealing your thievery – celebrate it if you feel like it.
In any case, always remember what Jean-Luc Godard said: “It’s not where you take things from – it’s where you take them to.” – Jim Jarmusch.
Where do you get inspiration?
I take inspiration where-ever I can find it. Because of my varied background I love all kinds of movement from dance to juggling and the most inspirational people I have found are the people who love what they do, have incredibly high skills and, most importantly, are pushing the boundaries physically, artistically and aesthetically. So people like Wes Peden, Rodney Mulland, RubberLeggz and Eric Bates. Also people like Lazy Legz, B-boy Checho, Bill Shannon and Aaron Fortheringham who have done amazing and creative stuff despite having disabilities and doing things that only they can do. I also like to find quotes that resonate with me. I’ll put some at the end of the email.
I hope to be going upside down my whole life. It’s my job but also my passion and I’ll only stop when my body makes me.
Food: I don’t have any strict dietary regime. I eat healthy food (and lots of it) but I don’t take any supplements or count calories or anything. Sweet foods don’t hold that much attraction for me so it’s easy for me to eat well.
Perfection is finally attained, not when there is no longer anything to add, but when there is no longer anything to take away.” — Antoine de Saint Exupéry
Which direction are your training taking?
For me training, flipping, handstanding should be fun so I generally do whatever feels good or right on each day. If Juggling is fun, I juggle, if tumbling is going well, I tumble. I’ve found that if I ever train something “to get that trick” than I have less fun and I’m less productive. In some of my videos you’ll see lots of variations on a certain trick because I like to take something basic like a kip-up and see how many ways I can get in or out of it. How can you make a forward roll interesting?
So often you see people trying for the hardest skills, but for me that becomes boring. I’ve seen people do one-arm presses and double corks hundreds of times but if someone does a neat transition or an interesting flip with their own style, I’ll rewatch and feel inspired. So that’s what I try and do. Which doesn’t mean one-arm presses or double corks are any less impressive, they’re incredible, it’s just not my direction. I still love to see the people pushing just the skills, the people who can pirouette under 7 clubs or do 5 one-arm presses in a row. But creativity and joy are what I want to bring to whatever artform I do.
Lewie’s saying:
“It’s never what you do, it’s how you do it.”
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