Archives for category: Hand Puppets
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

Puppet meeting

November 22, 2013 //
2

conference

Admittedly, communication between the Dedes and me hasn’t been so hot lately and I sensed there is a lot of uncertainty about what is going to happen; what I have lined up for them. I have a history of doing new things and just presenting them with what they have to do next. But I strongly believe somebody has to make the decisions around here. Personally, I am not a big fan of decisions by committee: when you try to please everybody you always end up with something boringly average. The majority of the Dedes, on the other hand, are a comfortable lot and are not very keen on change. So to debunk their fears I thought I would invite them to a full Dede puppet meeting and explain what I am up to, even though it only marginally affects them.

Would you believe it? A mere five puppets showed up. Out of how many? 63, 64. Isn’t it pathetic? Behind closed cupboard doors they whisper and complain. You would think they are planning a mutiny. But when they could come out and have their say, hardly anybody showed up.

They had their chance, and not showing up is not my fault. I still went ahead and told them what I have planned for next year and why all these strangely constructed actors have shown up. These are samples for a puppet workshop I am holding at a community artschool in Auckland in the beginning of next year. The course follows my own path into puppetry from the visual arts perspective, rather than from a theatrical point. I am keen to convey the self explorational properties of puppet making and it’s magical uses as a problem-solving tool. In one session I will use the Dedes, but ultimately I want the students to unleash their own creative thinking when it comes to puppet making. And by the end of the course we will have made a stop motion film. I am quite excited about this project.

But wait, there is more. I was invited by the manager of Estuary Arts Centre in Orewa (just north of Auckland) to co-curate a puppet month in July next year. We envisage a festival of puppet making, story telling and performance, and not just for children. This week I put an EOI note on Big Idea. It would be amazing to bring a bunch of puppeteers together and further object theatre in New Zealand. Needless to say I am equally excited about this project.

So, fingers crossed, I can find enough students for the course to run and enough puppeteers to make puppet month happen…

The Dedes didn’t say much. They just wandered off when they realised my plans really didn’t involve them. I guess they didn’t know what to think about all this and have to confer with the other lot that stayed in the cupboard.

Tags , , ,
Categories Art, Hand Puppets, Life, Promotion, Relationships, workshop

Another newbie

November 18, 2013 //
2

biirdie and devil-4

On the weekend another new thingummy arrived on the scene. Of course, Devil came barging in and wanted to shoo the little thing away. He definitely wants to put a stop to all these new and strange creatures. The wonderful studio is supposed to be a Dede only space. Much to his surprise he’d found his equal this time. The Whateveritis was not intimidated by Devil‘s browbeating behaviour.

biirdie and devil-3

biirdie and devil

He was a bit shaken by the treatment he got, but I didn’t want to get involved. Let them fight it out. That will teach him a lesson!

Tags , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Social Network

Here comes trouble

November 12, 2013 //
6

alien office manThe Dedes are terribly upset with me again. They are still elated about our film making. We even have set the date for the next Dede Workshop. It will be on the 3oth of November. So we were on the road to happiness together and then this little man came along.

This is Office Man. The Dedes say he looks like an Alien. He is different and they don’t like him. End of story! They believe he will need too much attention and is far too difficult to work with. And then Devil demanded I explain why I spent time making him, when the Dedes were waiting for me to do things with them. I had to remind Devil, and all the others, that our relationship was never meant to be exclusive. I am so disappointed about the Dedes, as I had invited Office Man to announce some great news to them. But as he waived his friendly hello, the Dedes just took one look at him and scuttled back into their cupboard and left him standing there. No wonder Office Man is sad.

I went after them and said they won’t hear the news until they remember their manners and are a bit more welcoming towards the new arrival! I guess there will be a long period of silence again, unless their curiosity gets the better of them.

Tags , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Relationships

The sequel

November 3, 2013 //
2

Cash Cow didn’t move from her place after Professor’s performance last week and has been pondering about the sense of Dada poems ever since. I now proudly present to you the sequel to the Dede Dada Do and yes, I can resist calling it Dede Dada Dodo. It is simply called Dede Dada Do 2, or Art for Art’s sake.

Enjoy!

Special thanks to Miss Viwi, who kindly allowed me to use her Dada poem.

Tags , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life

Flash Drama

November 1, 2013 //
4

All the Dedes had so much fun doing the little films that they definitely want to continue doing more. We are not short of ideas. They were surprised to find out their art form even has a name. “Flash Drama”. I came across the term on Wikipedia and I thought it describes what the Dedes are doing to a tee. So I researched a bit more. A flash drama is a short play, as short as several seconds and up to 10 minutes in length. It is played out by a single character or very few characters. The drama genrally unfolds in one act, though blocking and lighting may be used to imply jumps in time or between locations. The set is minimal or non-existent. In German there is a similar thing called Mini Drama or Dramolett (I love the word Dramolett), but this can be up to 20 minutes. Does this mean the Germans are more longwinded? Just kidding!

pirouette1

Anyway, I will do something today that I usually steer clear of. I will explain the moral of the “Elephant in tutu” dramolett. It is sad, but the drama depicts the year I have had! Yes, apart from the Dedes I had a pretty shoddy year. I danced my little heart out, admittedly I  sometimes misjudged the situation and missed the beat, but in general I thought I did a relatively good job.  But the critiques didn’t like it. No explanation needed, just a simple and resounding NO! Like Push Push I felt like chucking it all in, but I know very well, when I drop my tutu, someone will pick it up and continue. Everybody is replaceable. Dropping the tutu should be a considered action. Generally you don’t get it back! Though sometimes it is worth chucking in the tutu and taking up singing instead.

Safe landing everybody!

pirouette2

Tags , , , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Social Network

Behind the scenes

October 29, 2013 //
0

pig camera

Last year when Pig was on stage at the Super Dede competitiion, he got terrible stage fright. I am happy that he has finally found his calling: He loves to work the camera and vowed to leave the stage in future to his mate Professor. Now that they both have found something to do, I hope they will move out of my liquor cabinet and find another place to live. Having them squatting there got rather expensive for me.

Tags , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Social Network

And here is the film

October 28, 2013 //
12

Here it is: The film of the Dede Dada do!

First the link and then I’ll tell you all about it.

The film is dedicated to fellow blogger Tony who has the blog x-raypics.  Tony kindly sent me a Dada poem when I first floated the idea back in June. He works in radiography and uses a speech recognition program to convert his spoken notes into written text. He found out that when you feed this program with real poems it spits out Dada type text. So he kindly provided me with a sample called Dada Jack and Jill. (Figure out the original text :))

On Saturday, finally, a few people gathered in my studio to create a short film around the poem. Professor loves the arts and held his hand up to perform. A good disscussion ensued as not all the Dedes share his enthusiasm for this type of art. While Cash Cow is also fond of the arts, for her it has to be accessible and make sense. (Only the initiated will know why she is wearing a feather boa). I don’t know how many of the other puppets clapped and cheered only because that’s what you do when you watch a performance. Needless to say we had a lot of fun on and off the stage and thank you Tony for your wonderful poem.

We ran out of time on Saturday to record the spoken words, but I always thought it might be nice to do the full circle and use a TTS (text to speech) program to read out the text. I spent yesterday afternoon putting the film together and the first program I used was difficult to understand. Originally I considered it wasn’t important that the conversion back into voice was turned into unrecognisable mumble jumble and uploaded the file last night. But then, if you watch the film without knowing the background story, it might be viewed as poor quality. That irked me all night. This morning I found a new program and replaced Professor’s voice. Apologies to all the people I have sent the link to already. I really owed it to my collaborators to make the best possible film out of the material we’d produced on Saturday.

And now I have the sequal in my head, I guess I have to run another workshop. Any takers?

 

 

Tags , , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Promotion, Social Network, workshop

Dede Dada do

October 27, 2013 //
0

Yesterday was the big day. The official opening of the Dede studio space! And what a wonderful day it was. I am not one for big parties and hadn’t invited many. Even thought the Dedes want to pull a big crowd, I prefer it when everybody can talk to everybody and rather have a few little parties than one big one. Much to the dissappointment of the Dedes there was just a handful of us to watch them perform their Dada poems. Of course, there was a long discussion about the sense and non-sense of Dada poems and in the end we ran out of time. Therefore I can’t show you the film of the show yet :), but it is in the making. Watch this space.

action

I really should have had the camera out in the run up to the event. Then you could have seen Witch throwing her wooden spoon a couple of times while she was preparing the food for the guests, Nothing seemed to work for her. Thankfully, one of the Dede fans brought some tiny muffins that we were going to eat after the show. Guess what? By the time we wanted to have some they were all gone! We suspect Pig can’t read.

pig pigging out

Tags , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Promotion, workshop

Return of the tutu

October 24, 2013 //
0

mouse and push push

This morning Mouse walked up to Push Push, tutu in hand, and said “You shouldn’t give up. I had a go, it is not as easy as it looks.”

“I try and try and try so hard. I don’t seem to get anywhere” Push Push replied. “You know, at one stage you just run out of steam.”

“That is a common, but true tale. If you do something unusual, you get knocked back more often. You have to admit we are more used to dancing fairies than elephants” said Mouse when she handed over the dress. “I’d say, stick to your guns girl! And maybe compare yourself with elephants, not fairies, for now.”

Tags , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Social Network

Film: Elephant in Tutu

October 23, 2013 //
6

I had a hard time last night convincing Push Push to publish her video. After all, it is her performance and she has to okay it. (Note to self: Ask for signature before start of recording!). Last night she was exhausted and utterly dissappointed by the reaction of the audience. “They’re Philistines! All of them!” she exclaimed.

When I showed her the film, she had to admit, that she was slightly out of time. She turned round and blamed me for this. Could you believe it? She had in fact practised with a totally different and very nice classical piece. It was me who made her change it at the last minute as her first choice was copyrighted. Note by Push Push: Never let anybody bully you into last minute changes!

She lamented that you get judged by the result, and the result only. The viewers have no idea how much time and hard work goes into practise, practise, practise. And worst are the critics. They sit on their silly red sofa and with one shake of their head they can knock your confidence for good.

I tried to console her. It wasn’t that bad at all… but judge for yourself.

Tags , , , , , , ,
Categories Absurd, Art, Comedy, Creative Writing, Fun, Hand Puppets, Life, Promotion
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »