This article aims analyzes the institutional logics in the formation of the organizational field of contemporary circus in the Brazilian and Canadian contexts. For this, we formed a theoretical link between the concept of institutional logics and the formation of the organizational field contemporary circus, based on a multi-site ethnography in Brazil, with a Brazilian circus organization from the state of Rio Grande do Sul, and in Canada, with the circuses of the province of Quebec, in 2013. The main results emphasize the professional, state and market institutional logics as prominent in the organizational fields of circus studied, though linked to different working practices in each of the two countries studied, due to cultural, social and organizational differences between them. We present a theoretical and methodological approach to the study of cultural and artistic organizations that have incorporated different management practices into their constitutions, which should be thought of in other organizational contexts as a means of understanding the relationship between culture, organization, market and state.