Ninon Parent Bio

Ninon Parent was born in Rouyn-Noranda, a northern town in Quebec, Canada, where creativity quickly became part of how she saw the world. From making clothes for her dolls to adding extra flair to school assignments, she was always drawn to making things by hand. At 12, she won a citywide safety poster contest—an early encouragement that helped spark a lasting interest in visual storytelling, while her 8 years of dance class began her interest in physical storytelling.

Ninon, began her professional career with a degree in ceramic art at the Collège du Vieux Montréal.

She jumped into the world of circus with the National Circus School in Montreal, and was asked to join Cirque du Soleil after just one year of training. After touring with Cirque du Soleil for two years, she left to co-create one of Vancouver’s first circus companies, The Underground Circus. Using her comedic and acrobatic skills, she created and performed in close to 3000 shows around the world. In addition to directing and overseeing circus training, Ninon also heads up the concepts and fabrication of the elaborate costuming and textiles seen in The Underground Circus shows. 

After a knee injury derailed a promising career doing stunts in the movie industry, she stumbled head first in the fashion industry.  She earned a degree in fashion design at Blanche McDonald plus an award for Fabric Innovation. Byninon begun here.

Based in Vancouver, Ninon paints from her studio inside The Underground Circus. Her style could be called layered figurative abstract, featuring rich colours, transparent layers, and enigmatic figures—graceful women, curious animals, set within dreamlike environments that blend natural and architectural forms.

Ninon completed the course in visual arts at the Milan Art institute to further develop one of The Underground Circus’s original ideas, aerial painting, as a way to continue her performance career. Tapping into her years of performance art, Ninon is exploring working suspended in a harness, using inverted and sideways positions while applying paint to the canvas, a fusion of movement and visual art developing this rich medium to explore uncharted territory letting each piece be part of a larger exploration of expression, connection, and curiosity