London International Mime Festival: what to see

After their smash hit 'Bromance', UK alt-circus stars are ready to open 2019's instalment of LIMF with a new show. 'Shift' is a lo-fi display of spectacular acrobatic skill, performed with wit and storytelling. 

Olivier de Sagazan becomes a human canvas in this astonishing dance piece, which coats his body in layers of paint and clay. He's bringing his solo performance 'Transfiguration' to LIMF 2019 ahead of his appearance in Mario Sorrenti's supernatural thriller, 'Discarnate'.

Theatre Re make moody, beautiful performances that use mime and dance to explore complex emotions. Their new show 'Birth' is explores ideas of pregnancy, family history and psychogenealogy, set to live original music.

This eerie sci fi show from UK company Green Ginger is set in a future where people can buy the services of Intronauts: tiny shrunken workers who do maintenance work inside their bodies. Using animated set design and puppetry, 'Intronauts' is a quirky glimpse into an imagined future. 

Fans of all things uncanny, look sharp: Les Antliaclastes are back at London International Mime Festival 2019 with a thoroughly creepy looking wordless performance. Masked performers, automatons, and puppets made of broken toys and animal skulls combine to act out a fairytale, which unfolds when a giant cuckoo clock chimes 13. 

This magical micro-performance by Catalan artist Xavier Bobés whips through the history of Spain in the second half of the twentieth century, using nothing more than a tabletop and a handful of tiny props. It returns to the 2019 London International Mime Festival after a sell-out run in 2016.

Dance duo Thick & Tight mix drama, lip-synching and queer aesthetics in this triple bill. They'll conjure up icons from Claude Cahun to Princess Di in a series of witty duets and solos. 

Gecko's swirling dance piece 'The Wedding' dresses each cast member up as a bride, to explore the formal and emotional bonds between individuals and society, and the ties of tradition. 

Mime Fest regular Thomas Monckton is a master of manipulating his own body, creating strange and hilarious physical works. His follow-up to his hit 'Only Bones' unfolds in a paint-splattered artists' studio, where attempts to create art result in total mayhem. 

Valerie Jean Solanas is notorious for trying to murder Andy Warhol, and for her violent feminist text SCUM Manifesto. Puppetry company Plexus Polaire use life-size human puppets, jagged music, hallucinatory video imagery and plenty of wit to tell her story in their show 'Chambre Noire'.