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
Author: Wicks, Emily
2014 UConn Fall Puppet Slam
The 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
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.