Archives for the month of: November, 2012
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Home coming

November 20, 2012 //
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I am so happy… our heroes from the “Wallace Art Award” came back home yesterday. All the Dedes were excited and organised a ticker tape parade for their return. But boy, were our five travelers exhausted. Actually only four were exhausted and guess who was the chirpy one?

“Aliens don’t sleep”, a very grumpy Liar told me, and I think he was telling the truth for a change.

Alien had wanted to party all night, every night! And since the other artworks were very different and a bit stand-offish, he pestered his four friends, who gradually turned into his enemies. Ms SM, who can be a night owl herself, said they got so annoyed with him they even hatched a plan to push him aside, but  he fell off his stick instead. They felt bad about that, but luckily he didn’t break. The next morning the curator came along and put him back up. So they got a few hours reprieve, but didn’t dare try again. From then on they just gritted their teeth. They all agreed it was extremely difficult to live together in those crammed conditions for such a long time (they were away for six weeks). And they pledged never to go on holidays with friends again.

Very much to the disappointment of the Dedes who stayed at home, all the returnees retired early last night. Only Alien was prepared to tell a few more tales, but he had to make a quick phone call first and so went into the garden. When he didn’t come back for ages everybody toddled off, rather disappointed.

What a fizzer of a party! Some of them agreed we will have a proper home coming party on Saturday. If the travelers are up to it, that is!

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships

Failed reunion

November 19, 2012 //
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Yesterday, Chance invited her half-sister Detail and her niece, Minor, for a picnic on my yoga mat. They hadn’t seen each other for months. These two sisters have a really strange love/hate relationship and I normally wouldn’t comment on anything family related, as the puppets can get very defensive when you talk about a close relative.

I have admitted it before, I favour Chance over Detail. Chance is much more relaxed. She doesn’t mind if you ignore her when you are otherwise engaged. She just shrugs her shoulders and says: “Your loss not mine” and leaves.

Detail on the other hand has a knack for driving me up the wall (particularly when I am already stressed). She always wants to have it done her way! Don’t get me wrong, it is good to know her and in less stressful situations – when I have plenty of time and can pay her enough attention – she is really, really lovely. You just need to know how to take her. Let’s face it, Detail wants to be super woman. She is a solo mum and it can’t be that easy with a teenage daughter like Minor. And I suspect she is only so finicky because she actually lacks confidence. She gets a lot of security by spending an exorbitant amount of time on precision.

Bring on Chance the airy fairy one and, I mean, honestly… any outsider can see that this can’t go well. But what can you do if it is family? Well, one thing is for sure, I want to stay out of their arguments. If you get caught in the middle….

Often their bone of contention is around  Minor. Chance doesn’t have kids of her own, so she dots on Minor when she can. Unfortunately Detail thinks Minor has picked up a few bad habits from her aunty. In particular, this very aggravating “wha-ever” response.

Back to yesterday…

True to herself, Chance was late, fifteen minutes or so. This of course set Detail off on the wrong foot. When Chance finally arrived with a bowl of prezel bows, Minor (who has a slight weight issue) dived with her hands into the bowl before it was placed on the mat. Detail exploded immediately, telling her daughter she should pay more attention to her appearance. Chance tried to defuse the situation and said teenagers have to eat a lot.

Detail jumped up and said, “you always undermine what I am doing”, grabbed Minor by the wrist and dragged her out the door.

Chance popped a pretzel bow in her mouth and said: “Ah well. I guess that is it for the next six months”

That was the shortest family reunion I have ever seen!

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships

Chance is back

November 18, 2012 //
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Chance is one of my favorite Dedes. You couldn’t really call her a  beauty, and she is easily overlooked. I love her for all the different angles she has. She is indeed a very weird bird. Anyway, Chance has been away, staying in the office for while. She was supposed to charm visitors, but Foxy Lady – who was on the same assignment – made a much better impression. Foxy Lady is quite something, but this is a different story… Today it is about Chance and her family.

Chance is footloose and fancy free and has no fixed abode. So you can’t look her up. You have to wait until she comes round to your place to see you. Now, due to her long absence she felt it necessary to meet up with her half-sister Detail and her niece Minor (the sloppy teenage daughter of Detail) for a family reunion. Detail really hates it when Chance just pops in unannounced. No, no, you can’t just pop in and visit Detail, you have to ring a few days ahead, so she can bake a cake and clean the house.

So, Chance was in a bit in a pickle. On the one hand she wanted to see her sister, but she couldn’t just go round to her place. So she asked me if she could invite her relatives to have a picnic on my yoga mat later today. I love to help and said yes, even though personally I think it is not such a good idea. I know Detail will get her knickers in a twist. Chance will forget something  and without doubt I will hear about her gaffe for an entire week.  I can hear Detail already: “Oh this useless sister of mine, she couldn’t even lay the table for the reunion.” But I stay clear of any family matters; Chance and Detail are just like chalk and cheese and Minor doesn’t really help either. Her favorite expression is “Wha-ever”. (Which, by the way, drives Detail bonkers as well.)

While I had Chance there, I asked her opinion on what I should do in regards to the blog. I am a bit concerned that we don’t get that many likes lately. Chance immediately said, the Dedes need to get their art-life balance right.

“You mean work-life balance” I corrected her.

“No” she said, “the work-life balance is for humans… But for us Dedes it is the art-life balance.” and then she explained that although the Dedes are art, they don’t want to be inaccessible and aloof. For them it is really important that everybody can find something in them, independent of gender, age or culture.

“Now this is a tall order” I said “You will never achieve that!”

“You can do but try!” she said and was on her way.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

The end of dharna

November 17, 2012 //
1

We went to a function at the biennial exhibition NZ Sculpture OnShore last night. I really wished the Dedes could have seen it. But they are not the outdoor type. They can’t stand the rain. The exhibition is at Fort Takapuna, a disused military space high on the cliffs overlooking the sea, a perfect location for a sculpture show.  The evening was balmy with a slight sea breeze. The light wind and the setting sun played whimsically with many of the sculptures. It felt like art heaven… and on a more mundane note… we had the best fish and chips ever. I couldn’t stop thinking the Dedes should be there as well. I have to find a way to water proof them. They really should be allowed to enjoy the gorgeous view from Fort Takapuna one day.

When we arrived back home, a light drizzle had set in (heavy rain is forecast for today) and the Dedes who were on their dharna shift were huddled together at the front door. There is an alcove which gave them a little bit of protection from the elements. I felt sorry for them but didn’t want to give in just yet. Personally I think I haven’t done them enough harm to justify a dharna. So I just stepped past them to unlock the door.

Socialite held on to my trouser leg and asked: “Could we come in and sit on the window-sill inside to continue our dharna? It would be dry and people could still see us.”

I had to laugh “Nice try” I said “but no, that is not how it works… Maybe it is time we talked.”

As Philosopher didn’t want to be involved they had elected Witch as their mediator. She was more than ready to come to the table. In fact she was already there when I came into the kitchen. We closed the door so that nobody could hear what was said. Witch told me in confidence she thought everybody overreacted a bit and I immediately said I was very happy to apologise. I had already said so on Buchalov’s Blog. Buchalov was so kind to dedicate a post to the Dedes, and in a comment I said that it wasn’t a good idea for me to have told the Dedes they should learn a lesson from Buchalov. He is a very nice chap, but not a role model for the Dedes. (By the way, Buchalov, lovely drawing of Mrs Esta Blished, the fairy godmother).

“From now on, cross my heart, I will let you be who you are. You have some strong supporters out there in the big wide world!” I finished my speech.

“Only time will tell” Witch mumbled, but I chose to ignore this.

Then we continued to chit-chat about the exhibition for a while. We didn’t want the others to know that we were in agreement right from the beginning.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

Let’s give it a go!

November 16, 2012 //
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The Dedes have made themselves scarce after my outburst two days ago. I really think it wasn’t that big an outburst to justify their reaction. I just told them what was on my mind and you should be able to do this amongst friends, shouldn’t you? I wanted to give them an idea about how to improve themselves and education is always a good thing, isn’t it? But judging from their reaction I must have hurt them a lot!

Philosopher is the only Dede who still speaks to me apart from Bad Conscience (the guy I am not so keen on). Philosopher told me they always believed our relationship was based on mutual love and respect, but my outburst indicated that my love for them was somewhat lesser than theirs for me. But he added in his opinion there is no way you can measure love, he was only the bearer of the message. This is his style of telling me the subject is not open for discussion. He has no mandate to speak on behalf of all the Dedes. And he added: “I personally love you all the way to the moon and back.” It was heart warming and I had to give him a hug, even though he is not the huggy type of puppet.

While we were having our conversation something was going on at the front door. At first I ignored it. It sounded like an entire army of rats or possums or cats were running over the front porch. But then I heard whispering as well and I knew the Dedes were up to something. I had to ask Philosopher.

“They are doing a Dharna” he said. I looked at him blankly.

“They didn’t know either what it was, but Arindam suggested it to them. You know their friend from India? He seems to think it is an effective method to get an apology from you!”

He told me that after Arindam had planted the idea, Mouse had invited them all to the kitchen to look up on the internet about how to do a Dharna. They figured out a Dharna is a means to show the world that somebody had not treated them in a just way. So, they have to go to the offenders house and fast on the doorstep until they get justice or die.

I’m sorry if they got it wrong, it was their first attempt and they had to learn it via the internet. When they voted on whether they should go ahead, Devil immediately said he thinks it is basically a good idea, but with his love for food, there is no way he could participate. He suggested to send Skeleton Edeltraut to my doorstep, as she doesn’t eat anyway. Even though they thought it was a brilliant idea, they all agreed one puppet on my doorstep wouldn’t have much effect. After all, they all had been offended by me. In the end they decided there are enough Dedes to divide them up into groups and take 8 hour shifts. As long as Skeleton Edeltraut was always there, surely no passerby would notice that they had swapped. And then they went to bed to start in the morning.

The first shift is out there now.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

Not this fellow again!

November 15, 2012 //
9

Bad Conscience was waiting up for me last night to have a chat when I came home from sports. Nobody else was around. Seeing Bad Conscience is never a good sign. He was blobbing out on the sofa with his bloated tummy, burping away. Generally he doesn’t say much. You have to start the conversation, otherwise it is just an awkward situation. He sits in one corner regurgitating. You hardly see him, but he makes sure his presence is felt.

“So what’s up?” I tried to be cheerful, knowing very well he had a major concern and I could expect some unpleasant truth.

“You behaved like a girl today” he said and shook his head “Like a girl, girl, a childish girl”

“What do you mean?” I replied, as I really didn’t know what he was trying to say to me.

“You tried to change our behaviour – all the Dede’s behaviour”

“No I didn’t”

“Yes, you did…you did….you are not happy with us, so you want to change us to conform with your worldview.”

“No I don’t”

“Yes you do, you want us to be more intellectual. You said so!”

“Maybe a little” No point denying it, he knows anyway. But once Bad Conscience gets a little foothold by you admitting he is sort of right he goes off like a rocket…

“When will you learn that not everybody can be everything to you! It is not going to happen, Missy! If you need to discuss art, don’t go to Pig, see L’artiste or make a new Art Critique… You can’t make us all intellectuals. Forget it! If we can’t be who we are, we will disintegrate. There will be nothing left of us. pfffffffff” He made the sound of a deflating balloon.

“But…”

“Pffffffff”

“But…”

“Pffffff”

At this stage I gave up. I know him too well. He said his piece and left me to it. No more discussion!

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

Identity crisis

November 14, 2012 //
5

It is not all honkie dory in the Dede household at the moment. The Dedes and I are not on particularly good speaking terms for the time being. I told them about a blog I came across, written by the German artist Jürgen Küster. He writes his blog together with his Alter Ego art figure Buchalov (there is an English translation at the bottom of each post).

My very first thought (cross my heart!) was: Isn’t that typical, here is a man – all he needs is one (1) figure to discuss all the issues. Then here  I am (female) and I need at least thirty (30)! and still don’t come to a conclusion.

But then there are more differences. Buchalov is very supportive of his artist. As I understand it, he critiques the work of Jürgen in a helpful way. He is more like a mentor. They have deep and meaningful conversations, beneficial to the artist’s progress.

Oh, I wish I could have a deep and meaningful conversation with my lot, but no… intellectual the Dedes  are not! Look at  them, they are all over the place. All they want to have is fun. And when they get into a pickle, it is me who has to bail them out. No support from them at all. They are unruly little creatures. Even worse, whenever I say something, they say “Yes, but…” and then they give me this long spiel about why I can’t be right!

So I got a bit annoyed with them yesterday. I said they should be a bit more considerate. They are living in my house and it would be very kind if they wouldn’t challenge everything I say. Then I pointed to the art books on the shelf and said they should go and study for a bit. They looked at each other and said: “What’s wrong with her today?” and disappeared, leaving the art books behind. Only Philosopher continued his nap on the sofa unfazed.

“I will sell you all and only keep one!” I called after them.

“No you won’t” a voice from the sofa replied

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

Who still sends Postcards?

November 13, 2012 //
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Something unexpected happened yesterday: The Dedes got a postcard! Yes, a postcard – Who still sends postcards?

What a wonderful surprise. We love to get letters and postcards. But nowadays when we trundle down to the letterbox it is usually to get bills and real estate advertisements, not handwritten notes, not even around Christmas time. I sometimes wonder what future historians will research when they want to find out what was going on between two like-minded greats. Their twitter accounts? Mmmhm, I don’t think so.

But I am digressing. Yes, indeed the postcard was addressed to the Dede puppets at my place. I couldn’t identify the handwriting at first. It was pretty scrawly and I had a very hard time deciphering it. But of course the Dedes wanted to know who thought of them and in the end Foxy Lady, who has really good eyes, took on the job of reading it out aloud. It said: “Dear Dedes, I am having a lovely holiday and will have lots to talk about when I get home. I have  been at a dress factory. You wouldn’t believe how many dresses there are!!!…I am looking out for a nice one, but it is so hard to choose. They are all so groovy.” At this point I felt a knot in my stomach, because I had ordered 10 plain black robes again. After all I am a designer and I love black myself. None of the Dedes has ever complained about my lack of fashion sense before, but now I could  clearly hear it between the lines.

Mouse was sitting in the corner chuckling away to herself. Of course it was her, but by dede… her handwriting! It looked as if she had too many G and T’s while sunbathing in the wicker basket there.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

We didn’t get the Award

November 12, 2012 //
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Sorry guys, this might be a bit of a boring post as it reports about our “Full Dede Puppet Meeting (FDPM)” yesterday. We had to have a FDPM as there are a lot of decisions to make at the moment. At least you can read the report – I had to be there! It was an all day meeting with every available puppet present. Even Clown, Chance and Foxy Lady came back home for this occasion. There were only three items on the agenda, so you think it would be a short meeting… Ohhhh nooo!

Here is the agenda:

1. Face book fan page. Yes or no!

2. Exhibition. How to proceed.

3. One Lovely Blog Award.

Devil’s Advocate presided over the meeting and Mouse took the minutes. As we still can’t agree on the Facebook page and the exhibition process it was mooted to form two sub-committees which will have to do some research and present their recommendations as soon as possible.

The most pressing item on the list was the “One Lovely Blog Award”, which was bestowed on us by Arindam last Wednesday. A lively discussion ensued (see below). The puppets are not big on awards (I think that is a German thing) and I have written about it in earlier posts (sushine award and to award or not award). But since the Dede puppets really, really appreciate Arindam’s participation in their lives they have of course unanimously agreed to accept the award.

If you accept the award you have to do the following.

1. Link back to the blog of the person who gave you the Award.

Here it is… Thank you Arindam (who writes the blog Whenintrovertsspeak ) for the award and your input into the Dede puppet blog. We love your comments!

2. Insert the picture of the award

http://whenintrovertspeaks.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/onelovelyblogawardgraphic.jpg

Done!

3. Tell 7 facts about yourself

And here the fun started. They were all shouting out their personal favorite facts about us. And Devil’s Advocate had to call them to order a lot.  In the end each had to write down one fact and one fact only. Then every fact was discussed by the entire group (if you are a member of a committee you know what a labourious process that can be) and then a vote was taken on whether the fact should be included in the list or not. Once the preliminary list was done, it was whittled down to seven items. There were a few long faces when a fact was voted out. In typical Dede fashion there were a lot of contradicting opinions. One puppet said: “We have no vices” while another one had written down “We have a lot of vices” Believe me it was chaos! A few hours later we finally had a publishable list of the facts we all agreed on.

1. We are real (for some)

2. We are unreal (for some)

3. Some people go gooey over us

4. Some people won’t even look at us because we are too scary

5. We act on the spur of the moment

6. When people don’t like us, we just walk away

7. The motto of Dietlind (that would be me!) is: “Don’t annoy me, or the puppet gets it!” That is pretty scary for all Dedes!

Getting this list together was quite a feat. There were 33 puppets at the meeting, which meant as many as 33 different opinions.

4. Nominate 15 other blogs for the award

Here the Dedes slowed down quite a bit. They got tired of discussing everything. But of course they have blogs they love. I will recount what I can remember from this part of the evening. (Mouse had a sore wrist by this time and refused to continue writing).

Witch immediately suggested Veggietoria.  I am not surprised. Even though Witch is not vegan, she has – what others might call – some strange dietary requirements.  Witch‘s favorite site is based in Austria, unfortunately this means it written in German (all the Dede puppets are bilingual). There were a few other German blogs named, but for the benefit of the majority of our readers, we decided to exclude them.

Sunny the aspiring artist suggested Artist at Exit 0  This is an absolutely amazing project, really worth a look. Sunny wished he would have had this idea himself (he thinks that could have been his break through).

L’artiste of course loves anything arty like Fragments or  Chicquero or Anarty to name but a few. He just loves to look at sites to see what his colleagues are doing. He calls this his inspiration.

Professor and Pig are more for the funny blogs. They absolutely love ButIambeautiful. They suggested this blog, even though we already named it for the “Sunshine Award” earlier this year and we don’t want double ups.

Deutsch Fraulein (German Girl) piped up and said: “If we can have double ups, I want to put Mindretrofit forward. She writes such lovely poems, even though they are sometimes not that easy for me to understand as a second language speaker.”

Pirate the entrepreneur of course voted for  Cristian Mihai. I think there might be a bit of professional envy here :). Pirate would really like to push the Dedes for more publicity. But the rest are stalling him. They want to have a quiet life.

Philosopher loves the writing of Kate Shrewsday. Well founded stories and wonderfully phrased, that is his liking! Young puppy Lou on the other hand adores the stories of Alice’s Adventures in New York City.  Fairy Godmother, who fancies herself as a bit of a writer, admires Dianne Gray for all she has achieved and therefore follows her blog closely.

And then there are the photographic blogs we all enjoy, such as Photo Nature Blog or Little frank Photos or Patrick Latter with his amazing hiking photographs.

“15…” Mouse called out. We all got a big surprise, as we thought she had fallen asleep. “Lets go home!” In a flash she had put all her pens back into her satchel.

“Hang on, we still have to notify the blogs… that is the last requirement” I said. But Mouse replied: “It’s half past eleven now. I don’t feel like it. They will find out for themselves. Meeting closed at 23:30pm!”

And this is why we fell short of getting the Award!

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

Long awaited outing

November 11, 2012 //
4

Yesterday was the big day. Some of the Dedes went to a workshop. (Of course some of the puppets complained afterwards, as it was more work than shop. Actually there was no shopping at all. It was only work. But overall, they thoroughly enjoyed it). The photograph above shows Monkey waiting for someone to adopt him for the duration of the workshop. It looks suspiciously like he is holding his left hand open to accept a bribe.

I was really pleased with how it all panned out. Everything seemed to be just right: the length of the workshop, the activities for the participants, the size of the group and the make-up of the group. I have to fine-tune my introduction though. This was the only part I was unhappy with. Devil wasn’t in good form at all. You might remember I grounded him for a week (for trying to send Daredevil into the sky with a Guy Fawkes rocket). But then yesterday I packed him into the box to work with me at the workshop. He complained as he thought grounded means he is not supposed to work either. We had a long argument in the car and therefore the introduction didn’t go too well. Okay, it is a lame excuse, I should be able to put this aside if I want to be a professional!

The elephant was extremely lucky with her puppeteer. These two were whispering and laughing away. In the photo below, the elephant, who had taken on the name Elemate for the session, was asked by Mouse what her little pet hate was. At first she was a bit shy and asked her puppeteer how to phrase it so not to offend anybody in the room, but then she trumpeted it out in the open: She hates gossips. You should have seen Mouse, she went a paler shade of grey.

It was very hard convincing some of the puppets to hop back into the box and travel back home. For the participants I had made postcards with a photo of the puppet they had adopted, so they have something to remember their little friend by.

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Categories Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life
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