Florence Delahaye

Florence Delahaye is a French aerial performer, choreographer and dance teacher who built her career at the intersection of Parisian music hall and contemporary aerial spectacle. Her documented professional story begins in 1977, when she took a contract in the music-hall revue at the Jardin des Champs-Élysées in Paris. There she met Pierre Bergam, whose influence added aerial practice to her work as a dancer—a pairing of dance phrasing with suspended apparatus that would define her entire career.

Delahaye subsequently worked across the French and Monegasque entertainment circuit, performing French-cancan solos, acrobatic pas de deux, smooth rope, hoop and fabric at venues including the Casino de Paris, Radio Monte Carlo's touring revue, the casinos of San Remo and Monte Carlo, Jean-Marie Rivière's Alcazar revue, the Folies Bergère, Bobino, the Élysée-Montmartre and the Cirque d'Hiver Bouglione.

In 1991 she began working as an aerial choreographer while continuing to perform. Her state diploma as a dance teacher and additional study in Feldenkrais practice, climbing, stunt work and acrobatics reflect an intentionally cross-disciplinary approach: dance supplied line and musical organization, while technical training addressed grip, load, orientation and risk. In 1997 she created a Paris course devoted to trapeze and smooth rope.

Delahaye's teaching became visible through the performers she trained. Aerialist Séverine Bellini studied trapeze with her, and performer Caroline Cottier credits Delahaye with the aerial choreography for *Tarzan, la Rencontre* at Disneyland Paris. From 2005 onward, Delahaye partnered professionally with Gabriel Dehu, a gymnast and hand-to-hand performer. Under the name FloGab they developed a method for training artists on aerial apparatus and performed together as Duo Requiem. By their own account, beginning in 2006 they trained more than 200 international artists in aerial disciplines and created choreography for commercial and theatrical producers. A 2015 report credited Delahaye with aerial choreography for Disneyland Paris's *La Forêt de l'Enchantement*, and into 2023 she and Dehu continued their work as aerial trainers and choreographers.