The show I would be most curious to see at the Tarrengower Puppetfest in March (sadly I’m not going) is Hutch by Rachael Wenona Guy, which will take place in a disused gold mining tunnel known as Carman’s Tunnel. In a recent post, Rachael describes it as ‘a passion play involving a Mother, a giant rabbit and the rituals of nurturing an infant’ with an insatiable appetite. It looks creepy, and I’m sure that side of it will be enhanced by being seen in a claustrophobic shadowy ‘warren’.
This is a sample of DudaPaiva Company’s production Screaming Object, ‘an absolutely unusual work of abstract dance and puppetry’ by Maurício Oliveira and Duda Paiva. I find it mesmerising, disturbing, and rather wonderful.
A few months ago I posted about the giant aerial puppet, Phoebe Sparkles, made by David Jones and friends for the show Highly Strung, which was performed from silos at the Nati Frinj (Natimuk Fringe Festival). Dave has followed up with this great video of sequences edited together from rehearsals and the performance. The animations really add another dimension, and as he comments, it’s amazing to see the puppeteers in action.
I’m intrigued by this footage of the dragon Toothless taking flight for the first time at Melbourne’s Creature Technology Company! Toothless stars in DreamWorks and Global Creatures’ new arena spectacular How to Train Your Dragon Live which premieres in Melbourne on 2 March, then tours Sydney, Brisbane, and Aukland. Check out their new TV commercial, various other videos and their FaceBook page .
Previously: How to Train Your Dragon Live
I was amazed when I first learnt about Lotte Reiniger a few years ago and saw this video of how she made her stop motion shadow puppetry films. The intricacy and deftness with which she plans, cuts and arranges the silhouettes, and the matter-of-factness in how she describes the process is quite breathtaking.
The Icelandic band Amiina play beautiful new musical soundscapes for three of Reiniger’s animated fairly tales in their live show Animagica, which has been touring Australia recently. Their instruments include violin, glassophone, musical saw and water-filled glasses. Below is a sampler of the performance, but you can also see more-or-less complete filmed performances of Aladdin and the Magic Lamp, Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty at YouTube.
The UK contemporary puppetry company Folded Feather recently built two large spectacular puppets out of car parts for Hyundai’s New Thinkers Index, a campaign ‘about new thinking and new possibilities’.
Previously: Folded Feather’s chickens
Shortly after the Kinect was launched in late 2010 Emily Gobeille and Theo Watson from Design I/O used it make a quick interactive puppet protoype by skeleton tracking on an arm. Their updated 2.0 installation above, Puppet Parade, looks great fun, allowing
children to use their arms to puppeteer larger than life creatures projected on the wall in front of them. Children can also step in to the environment and interact with the puppets directly, petting them or making food for them to eat. This dual interactive setup allows children to perform alongside the puppets, blurring the line between the ‘audience’ and the puppeteers and creating an endlessly playful dialogue between the children in the space and the children puppeteering the creatures.
The unedited clip where it is easier to see the movements in more focus is also interesting. Although these are made differently they share some qualities with Philip Worthington’s earlier Shadow Monsters.
This fantastic air-powered 16 foot tall spider puppet is made by Tim Davies. Wired.co.uk has more technical details about the structure and how it operates. (I think this information must come from the artist’s site, but it is down at the moment).
Kate Bush’s cool shadow puppet animation, Eider Falls at Lake Tahoe, was made to accompany a segment of the track Lake Tahoe on her new album 50 Words For Snow. In a note about the animation on her site she credits Robert Allsopp for the beautiful puppets.
