Mr. Squiggle, a dearly loved kids TV puppet show in Australia for many years, has an exhibition as part of the Unima 2008 puppetry festival in Perth. Although its regarded as iconic, I have to admit running against the flow; I never really loved it either as a kid or an adult. I do like the puppets and their characters, though, and it was interesting to see how simply made they were made. Blackboard for instance is a piece of cardboard, with little (sand?)bags for feet, and the reason one of his eyes isn’t animated is that it was made so quickly they didn’t get that far. Of course, it gave him more character! Blackboard and Gus the cantankerous snail were always my favourites.

Mr.Squiggle’s creator, Norman Hetherington, and his wife Margaret, who scripted the shows, are both here at the festival.

• The photos below are licensed under a Creative Commons license. Please use them within the terms of the license or make special arrangements to use them, and list the photo credit as “Hilary Talbot” and link the credit to Spiritsdancing.com.

Mr. Squiggle

Bill Steamshovel. His neck and catapillar tracks are plain foam.

Gus

Update: my own squiggle.

My attendence at Unima 2008 is supported by the ACT Government