Author: Wicks, Emily

“Stages of Enchantment: The Puppet Theaters of Blair Thomas & Company,” October 25, 2014-February 22, 2015

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Pictured: Blair Thomas performing Buster Keaton’s Stroll, by Federico García Lorca. Photograph by Kipling Swehla

The Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry at the University of Connecticut will present the grand opening of Stages of Enchantment: The Puppet Theaters of Blair Thomas & Company on Saturday, October 25 at 4 p.m. at the Ballard Institute in Storrs Center. The opening events will include two performances of Thomas’ celebrated show The Selfish Giant, at 1 and 3 p.m. in the Ballard Institute Theater; and be preceded on Wednesday, October 22 at 7:30 p.m. by Thomas’ talk at the Fall Puppet Forum Series entitled Liminal Worlds: Design in the Puppet Theater.

In this new exhibition, celebrated Chicago puppeteer, director, and designer Blair Thomas interprets the traditional puppet booth in stages featuring boldly practical designs and a unique material-based aesthetic. Incorporating poetry, folksong, religious texts, and theatrical scripts as sources, Thomas re-invents the puppet stage as a self-contained world for rod, shadow, and hand puppets, Bunraku-style dolls, and marionettes. The exhibition will be on display through February 22, 2015.

In conjunction with the opening celebration and as part of our first-ever Fall Puppet Performance Series, Thomas will perform The Selfish Giant on October 25 at 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. Using original puppets and music, Thomas and singer/songwriter Michael Smith tell the story of this Oscar Wilde classic about a grumpy old giant and the children of his village who rejuvenate his garden. Seating will be limited. Tickets will be sold in advance through the Connecticut Repertory Theatre Box Office located in the lobby of the Nafe Katter Theatre at 820 Bolton Rd, Storrs, CT 06269. Tickets may be purchased in person at the box office, by calling (860) 486-2113, or online at: https://itkt.choicecrm.net/templates/UCRT/index.php?prod=bimp. Tickets may also be purchased at the Ballard Institute on October 25.

Prior to the exhibition opening, Blair Thomas will lead a presentation titled Liminal Worlds: Design in the Puppet Theater, on Wednesday, October 22, 7:30 p.m. as part of the Ballard Institute’s Fall Puppet Forum Series. Thomas will discuss his aesthetic process in the development of his puppets, stages, and stories in a session that will include a question-and-answer period. This event is free and open to the public.

Brian and Wendy Froud on Faeries, October 9 at 6 p.m.

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ortraits, drawings, studies and tales of those mysterious creatures, fairies, fill the pages of Brian Froud’s Faeries’ Tales by Brian and Wendy Froud. We meet individual fairies and learn their stories. Following their popular book Trolls, Faeries’ brings readers into the depths of the mysterious and enchanting realm of these intriguing beings. Brian Froud, a renowned British artist, has created some of the most respected and highly acknowledged mythic artwork of our time. He has won numerous awards, including the Hugo Award for Best Original Artwork. Wendy Froud is an American (born in Detroit) who is a doll artist, sculptor, and puppet-maker, best known for her work creating creatures for the Jim Henson films The Dark Crystal and Labyrinth, as well as her work on the Star Wars series, for which she was the fabricator of Yoda. The Frouds live in Devon, England. Bart Roccoberton, the Director of the Puppet Arts Program at UConn writes, “Brian and Wendy Froud have inspired the Puppet Arts, internationally, since the mid-1970s with their imaginations and creativity.”

Please call 860-486-8525 to reserve a seat.

RECEPTION at 5:30 p.m.

TALK: 6:00 p.m.

BOOKSIGNING immediately following

“Biblical Rapper’s Trilogy,” October 15 at 7:30 p.m.

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Amy Trompetter collaborates with East Harlem poet (not4)Prophet in reconfiguring her Punch and Judy show to create Biblical Rapper’s Trilogy.  References include the Bible, Medieval mystery plays, Commedia scenarios and the daily news, including recent events in Ferguson, Missouri. The stage is an automated, vertical box with painted backdrops reminiscent of cantastoria balladeers’ picture stories. 

Amy Trompetter designs, directs and performs puppet shows. Her roots are in the Bread and Puppet Theater in 1960’s NYC. She is the founder of the Redwing Blackbird Theater, a workshop and performance space in the Hudson Valley.

(not4)Prophet creates and performs hip-hop aesthetic poetry. He is an experimentalist, performance poet, singer, song writer,-activist and Nuyorican-style emoter, with roots in the Nuyorican Poet’s Café. He regularly presents original work in East Harlem and throughout NYC including the Bowery Poetry Club. Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry and the UConn Co-op Bookstore at Storrs Center.

The event will take place in the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry/UConn Co-op Bookstore performance space at 7:30 p.m. on October 15, 2015. Admission is free. Donations are gratefully accepted.

2014 Fall Puppet Forum Series

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Our first Fall Puppet Forum features puppeteer Amy Trompetter talking about “Buffa & Belly Laughs: A Return to the Roots of Rossini” on September 17 at 7:30 p.m. Trompetter, the creator of the current Ballard Institute exhibition Opera & Giant Puppets, will discuss the creation of her dynamic puppet production of Rossini’s Barber of Seville, and how, in her words, “the magic of puppetry unleashes humor, reveals lyricism, and illuminates the revolutionary spirit of Rossini’s 19th-century opera.”

The rest of the forum schedule includes:

Wednesday, October 1, 7:30 p.m.: Joanne Zerdy and Marlis Schweitzer, Performing Objects and Theatrical Things. Reading, discussion, and book signing for their new anthology from Palgrave Macmillan.

Thursday, October 9, 4:30 p.m.: Dassia Posner, Claudia Orenstein, and John Bell, The Routledge Companion to Puppetry and Material Performance. Reading, discussion, and book signing for their new anthology from Routledge.

Wednesday, October 22, 7:30 p.m.: Blair Thomas, Liminal Worlds: Design in the Puppet Theater. The celebrated Chicago-based puppeteer talks about his aesthetic process, in conjunction with the premiere of his exhibition at the Ballard Institute.

Thursday, December 4, 7:30 p.m.: Winnie Lambrecht, Puppetry and Politics in 1939: The Vagabond Puppeteers. Anthropologist and Rhode Island School of Design professor Winnie Lambrecht premieres her new film about political puppet theater among dairy farmers in upstate New York.

Forums occur in the Ballard Institute Theater. Admission to these events is free (donations greatly appreciated!), and refreshments will be served. This forum will also be live-streamed on our page: http://www.ustream.tv/channel/forum-live-stream 

2014 UConn Fall Puppet Slam

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Little Did ProductionsThe Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry and the UConn Puppet Arts Program will present the 2014 , on  The  will feature short works by professional puppeteers from the Northeast, including Little Did Productions from New York City; Great Small Works from Cambridge; and Connecticut’s Xing Xin Liu; as well as new works by talented students from UConn’s Puppet Arts Program. The  is supported by a generous grant from the Puppet Slam Network.

The Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry and the UConn Puppet Arts Program will present the 2014 UConn Fall Puppet Slam, on Saturday, September 13 at 8:00 p.m. in the Dramatic Arts Department’s Studio Theatre. The UConn Fall Puppet Slam will feature short works by professional puppeteers from the Northeast, including Little Did Productions from New York City; Great Small Works from Cambridge; and Connecticut’s Xing Xin Liu; as well as new works by talented students from UConn’s Puppet Arts Program. The UConn Fall Puppet Slam is supported by a generous grant from the Puppet Slam Network.

Little Did Productions’ The Lost Children, directed by Jessica Lorence and designed by Lorence and Katarra Peterson, is a shadow puppet show retelling the French folk tale which inspired Hansel and Gretel, with original music by Luke Santy.

Trudi Cohen and John Bell, Cambridge-based members of the Great Small Works theater company, will perform Sidewalk Ballet, which considers the world history of public space, and the 1960s battle between developer Robert Moses and urban activist Jane Jacobs over the future of Washington Square Park; and includes a new song by Woody Guthrie and Frank London of the Klezmatics.

UConn Puppet Arts alumna Xing Xin Liu will perform a traditional Chinese shadow show, Monkey’s Kung-Fu Lesson, based on the popular trickster figure Monkey King, whose exploits feature in the great Chinese epic Journey to the West.

The Puppet Slam movement is a nation-wide flowering of short puppet productions for adult audiences, encouraged by the Puppet Slam Network created by Heather Henson and Marsian De Lellis.  UConn Puppet Slams have been taking place since 2008, thanks to the generous support of the Puppet Slam Network.

The UConn Fall Puppet Slam is free and open to the public; donations are greatly appreciated. The event will take place in the Studio Theatre located at 820 Bolton Rd, Storrs, CT. For directions to the Studio Theatre, visit crt.uconn.edu/directions/. For more information, call the Ballard Institute at (860) 486-8580, visit bimp.uconn.edu, or email us at bimp@uconn.edu.

Community Puppet-Building Workshops with Sara Peattie

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The Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry at the University of Connecticut, in partnership with the Mansfield Downtown Partnership, will host Community Puppet-Building Workshops for area residents on Saturday, September 6 and Saturday, September 13 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Ballard Institute workshop space (1 Royce Circle, Storrs, CT). The workshops will be led by the Director of Boston’s Puppeteers Cooperative, Sara Peattie, and the Director of the Ballard Institute, Dr. John Bell, in collaboration with the UConn Co-op Bookstore.

Workshop attendees will make oversized masks of their favorite Connecticut authors. Participants will be invited to parade with their puppets in the Celebrate Mansfield Parade on September 21, beginning at noon. After the parade, the masks will be displayed at the UConn Co-op Bookstore in Storrs Center.

These mask-making workshops are free and open to all who would like to participate. Attendees are not required to attend both workshops and can drop in anytime between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. to take part in the workshops. No prior puppet-building experience is necessary.

Pre-registration is recommended. Contact Emily Wicks at the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry at 860.486.8585 or emily.wicks@uconn.edu.These workshops are supported in part by the Downtown Mansfield Partnership. For more information, visit bimp.uconn.edu.