IF you were on Front Street last Saturday night then perhaps you caught a glimpse of the high flying, fire eating, acrobatic performance by Animate Objects Physical Theatre company during the opening celebrations of Bermuda's 400th anniversary. One of the full-time company members that took to the stage was Ty Barker, a Bermudian who was born, raised and taught his craft right here on our shores. Mr. Barker, who will soon turn 25, grew up in Warwick and attended Mount Saint Agnes Academy after which he set off for the US to attend college. Based in Miami, he returned this week with his dance troupe to delight audiences and receive rave reviews for their thought-provoking and entertaining show. The dancer, who is also participating in this year's Bermuda Arts Festival, took some time out of his busy schedule to meet with Mid-Ocean News reporter Lindsay Kelly and photographer Glenn Tucker to talk about how he got his start in this unique art form.

Q. When did you originally get into dancing?

A. When I was 15 years old my sister-in-law, Lizz Pimentel who runs Concepts in Motion forced me on stage during their annual performance. I performed salsa and swing when I first started.

Q. What aspects of dance do you like best?

A. What I'm doing now, which is the aerial and the circus performing arts, is really something that has drawn me in. Flying in the air, playing with fire, bouncing off of different apparatus is a lot of fun. It's just very physical and very unique. It's different and something that people don't get to see all that often, here especially. But even in Miami (where the group is based) there isn't anyone doing this type of entertainment as a company. Our company is very exclusive in what we do. It's just a lot of fun, all of the time.

Q. What training abroad did you do?

A. I went to the New World School of Arts in Miami and graduated from there two years ago with a BFA (Bachelor of Fine Arts) in Dance and Dance Education. Straight from graduation I joined Animate Objects Physical Theatre dance company.

Q. Can you explain to me about the types of dance and acrobatics that are included in your performances with Animate Objects?

A. We try to incorporate several things regularly, including traipse either single or duet, aerial silks, which is a fabric that you see people flying around on, bungee apparatus where you are able to bounce and can either do single or double point - you have unlimited access to movement with bungee. We also include a lot of work with stilts in our performances. We are in the process of developing and creating different types of apparatus that we can perform on and figure out what works for us. If we see and like things that other people are doing, we try and modify them to make it our own and incorporate them into our repertoire as well. For comparison's sake, people have compared us to Cirque de Soleil but we are trying to create our own name.

Q. How did you find out about this group?

A. A friend of mine actually told the director of the company, Ileigh Reynolds, about me because I had done some aerial work before so he put me in contact with her. We immediately gelled and went forward with it. I've been there a year as a full-time company member but I've been working with Ileigh for about a year and a half.

Q. Any performances that are particularly memorable for you?

A. The show we did in Bermuda this past weekend was probably one of our biggest shows. We just performed on New Year's Eve at the Atlantis in the Bahamas.

So we performed there New Year's Eve and flew out the next day straight to Bermuda. This past weekend was the biggest weekend we have had with the company yet and it's been a lot of fun.

Conchita Ming (Chairman of the Bermuda 2009 Steering Committee as well as a long-time dancer and choreographer) has been a big part of my life for a long time through dance, helping me out with scholarships and other aspects of a dancer's life in Bermuda. When she found out I was a part of this company she approached me and I put her in contact with Ileigh. From there we just ran with it and they brought us down to Bermuda. I think it was a very successful show.

Q. Are you the only male performer in your group?

A. Yes. We have about six people in our company and then we have add-ons that come in to do different performances if we need more people.

Q. Animate Objects is based in Miami, how do you like living there?

A. I love it. In Miami, there is something for everybody. If you like to party or if you like to relax you can do it all there. I, though, prefer to relax. The culture in Miami, with the Cuban influence, is very similar, in a way, to Bermuda with our Portuguese, black and white population. Similar climate, similar culture - so really I didn't really move all that far away from home, I'm just not physically living in Bermuda.

Q. What's your ultimate career goal?

A. Ideally, if the company can make it work and we can get a touring show that'd be great or if my path leads into a different career with a different company so be it. I'm also looking into tech and rigging work. I'd like to do something in the arts but I'm just going to go with the flow and see what happens. No point in really trying to set goals in this industry because it is so up and down a lot of the time.

Q. Where can we see you next?

A. I'll be participating in the Bermuda Festival of the Performing Arts on February 2nd with Concepts in Motion. It's a Concepts show, which is their annual performance but we've been selected to be in the Bermuda Arts Festival, which is a huge, huge honour for the company and for the people that are in the show.

I'll be performing two dance numbers and two aerial numbers so people will get to see where I came from and what I'm doing all in one show. It's definitely going to be a show worth seeing.

There are still limited tickets available to see Ty Barker in the Concepts in Motion performance during the 2009 Bermuda Festival that is scheduled for February 2 at the Ruth Seaton James Centre for the Performing Arts in Devonshire. For ticketing information, visit www.bermudafestival.org or call 232-2255.