I had some good news recently: in August Puppet Festival at the Estuary Art Centre in Orewa is going ahead as planned. Kim Boyd, the Centre’s manager has allocated the entire month to all things puppetry. I am really excited as I hope it will show how diversified puppets can be. We have Anna Bailey, a puppeteer from Wellington, coming up for 2 weeks and running workshops on puppet making and she will also perform some of her wonderful string puppet shows. Sarah-Jane Blake a performance designer, working in the UK and in NZ will also run workshops on story development and telling. Finally in the last week I will be facilitating stop motion animation workshops.
The Festival will start off with a buskers and market day on Saturday the 9th of August and then continues with an exhibition called “A story-teller’s world.” If you are in New Zealand and want to partake in the exhibition of puppets and other object which elicit imagination please get in touch with either me or the Estuary Arts Centre.
The bad news is that my Artstation workshop has once again very low enrolment numbers and is unlikely to go ahead. It is so sad that most people when they hear the word “puppet” dismiss it as a children thing, at least here in New Zealand.
While I was preparing my course, I came across this wonderful interview with the amazing Candadian puppeteer Ronnie Burkett by Gary Friedman (also a puppeteer working on a film about politicial puppetry at the moment). Ronnie explains so eloquently here what puppets are all about, its really worth watching.
dedepuppets 
Hey, thats interesting…i like the idea of puppets being dangerous and under the radar
Yes, the subversive aspect is the interesting part, isn’t it.
I like the emphasis on the performance as a defining feature of puppetry. You asked me before if I thought of my figures as puppets? I guess they could be…the performance aspect is more understated and implied through still images and words. Sorry to hear your workshop may be a no go. If people are turned off by the term “puppet”…is there something else you could call what you do?
Thanks for your always supportive words, artistatexit0. I really really appreciate your comments.
I have revamped the concept entirely. Instead of having a nine-week evening course I am now offering a weekend workshop and I banished the word “puppet” (Hello Marketing!). It is replace by the word “character”. In Europe puppet theatre was called object theatre for a while. I don’t warm to this term either, as it puts too much emphasis on theatre. As you said, performance is the defining feature of puppetry. But looking at it from the point of the performer: Going out on a theatre stage takes a lot of guts and confidence, the stage light is on the performer who is only be deemed good, when he is as convincing and life like as possible. Breathing live into a character on a puppet stage, on the other hand, is a extremely cathartic experience. The puppeteer is an invisible artist and who can play out all possible and impossible solutions. Strangely enough, by being over the top and impossible he can become convincing.
The more I research the subject, the more I believe in its beneficial uses for a variety of marginalised groups.
This is the reason why I am so quiet on the blog at the moment. I am talking face-to-face to a lot of stake holders… Wish me luck :)
Good luck! I understand about the cathartic value. Anyone who has donned a mask and assumed another persona other than their own gets a taste of that.
Yes, you are right. Funnily I don’t like masks. My opinion is that masks hide, while puppets reveal… With a mask you deliberately hide your personality, but when you play with puppets, you bring out your inner self… Does this make sense?