The Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry and the UConn Puppet Arts Program at the University of Connecticut will host Yael Rasooly’s internationally acclaimed puppet show Paper Cut for two special evening performances on Friday, April 5 at 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. at the Ballard Institute Theater, located at 1 Royce Circle in Downtown Storrs.

A lonely secretary remains in the office. From her little corner, using photos from old film magazines, she escapes into a world of daydreams. But as imagination and reality collide, her romantic tale becomes a Hitchcock nightmare! The language of black-and-white cinema is transformed to the low-tech universe of paper cutouts and object theatre, creating a tension that is absurd, painful, and absolutely humorous. Paper Cut has won several international awards and has toured in over 30 international festivals, such as the International Festival for Puppets in Charleville-Mézières, France; the Schaubude festival in Berlin; Denmark’s Festival of Wonder; the Forman Brothers Theater Boat in Prague, and many others. This show is recommended for ages 15+ and is 50 minutes in length.

Yael Rasooly is one of Israel’s prominent independent theater makers. She specializes in contemporary visual and object theater and has directed several Internationally acclaimed performances, both in Israel and Europe, which have been performed in over 30 countries worldwide. Yael was the international guest artist at the 2018 National Puppetry Conference at the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center in Waterford, CT. Yael Rasooly is also a singer of international reputation and her cabaret performance, Glamour in the Dark, is currently touring around the world. Yael Rasooly’s work in the United States is supported by the Israel Institute’s Visiting Israeli Artists Program.

Ticket Prices: Adults: $12; Members/Seniors: $10; Students: $8.

Tickets can be purchased in advance at the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry, by calling 860-486-8580, or online at bimp.ticketleap.com. A surcharge will be added to any purchases made online. There will be open seating and no reservations. Visitors can park in the Storrs Center Garage located at 33 Royce Circle. Parking is free for the first two hours and $1 per hour thereafter, with a daily maximum charge of $8. For more information about these performances or if you require an accommodation to attend this event, please contact Ballard Institute staff at 860-486-8580 or bimp@uconn.edu.

As part of its 2019 Spring Puppet Performance Series, the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry is pleased to present Go Home Tiny Monster by The Gottabees, from Boston, on March 30, 2019 at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. in the Ballard Institute Theater, located at 1 Royce Circle in Downtown Storrs.

One day, Sylvie and her family of handmade creatures suddenly find themselves in need of a new home. Luckily, they have an audience full of people who can help them out. Go Home Tiny Monster features the Gottabees’ trademark mix of puppetry, joyously absurd silliness, physical theater, live music, and surprising poignancy. This show is 40 minutes and is recommended for ages 3+.

The Gottabees are a Boston-based ensemble dedicated to creating inspirational, engaging, and

empowering theater for family audiences. The company is known internationally for uniting simple-but-elegant visual theater with astonishing technique. They apply their interdisciplinary training in music, dance, acrobatics, theater, and design to share original non-verbal stories set to live music

that weave together human and puppet characters in surprising ways. The Gottabees’ work earned a 2017 UNIMA-USA Citation of Excellence and won the Artistic Achievement Award for Puppeteers of America’s Northeast Region in 2015. The Gottabees have performed all over, including at the Center for Puppetry Arts (Atlanta, GA), La MaMa E.T.C. (New York City), Detroit Institute of the Arts (Michigan), Nashville International Puppetry Festival (TN), ICA/Boston (MA), Izmir International Puppet Days (Turkey), and Edinburgh Fringe Festival (Scotland).

Upcoming Spring Saturday Puppet Shows include:

April 27: Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Stevens Puppets

In an enchanted Alaskan forest, join a family of bears as they encounter different perspectives and values, ultimately sharing a common purpose with a salmon and resolving their conflict with a golden-haired trespasser, who learns precious lessons from them as well as from her bald eagle companion about respect, kindness, apologizing, and forgiveness. This show by Indiana’s famed Stevens Puppets is 45 minutes and is recommended for ages 3+.

May 11: Everybody Loves Pirates by Frogtown Mountain Puppeteers

Eight-year-old Lucy and her goofy pal, Little Chucky, are searching for buried treasure, but a gang of bumbling pirates keeps getting in the way! The kids get some help from their new ocean-dwelling friends, including enthusiastic superhero Lobster Boy, his reluctant sidekick Crabby, and an overgrown sea monkey. This show by Maine’s popular Frogtown Mountain Puppeteers is 50 minutes and is recommended for ages 4+. 

Ticket Prices: Adults: $12; Members/Seniors: $10; Students: $8; Kids: $6 (12 years and under).

Tickets can be purchased in advance at the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry, by calling 860-486-8580, or online at bimp.ticketleap.com. A surcharge will be added to any purchases made online. Tickets may also be purchased at the Ballard Institute on the day of performance starting at 10 a.m. There will be open seating and no reservations. Visitors can park in the Storrs Center Garage located at 33 Royce Circle. Parking is free for the first two hours and $1 per hour thereafter, with a daily maximum charge of $8. For more information about these performances or if you require an accommodation to attend this event, please contact Ballard Institute staff at 860-486-8580 or bimp@uconn.edu.

For its second installment of the 2019 Spring Puppet Forum Series, and as a part of 2019 UConn Gives activities, the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry at the University of Connecticut will host The Royal de Luxe Giants in Montreal: Poetics and Logistics in the Animation of Urban Space with Dr. Mark Sussman on Wednesday March 27 at 7 p.m. at the Ballard Institute Theater, located at 1 Royce Circle in Downtown Storrs. This event also takes place as part of the 2019 UConn Gives, a 36-hour giving initiative on March 27 and 28, where you can celebrate your favorite aspects of the University through giving. At this forum, attendees will have the opportunity to donate to the Ballard Institute, receive UConn giveaways, and make a puppet.

This presentation will discuss a rare 2017 appearance of the world-famous Royal de Luxe company in North America. Based in Nantes, France and led by director Jean-Luc Courcoult, the company comprises a large number of designers, mechanics, builders, and engineers who are also, by necessity, storytellers, performers, and community artists. Commissioned by various cities, the company tours the globe with a collection of giants: marionette-like figures operated by expertly trained teams of Lilliputian performers in a series of monumental and architectural interventions in the fabric of daily life.

Mark Sussman is a theatre artist, performance scholar, and a founding member of the Brooklyn-based collective Great Small Works. Dr. Sussman currently lives in Montreal, Quebec, where he is Associate Professor in the Department of Theatre at Concordia University, teaching courses in puppetry and performance studies. He is the founder of Café Concret, Montreal’s experimental puppetry cabaret series now in its 13th year, and is a member of the Canadian Consortium for Performance and Politics in the Americas. In 2019, he will be working again with Great Small Works on a new episode of the surreal news serial, The Toy Theater of Terror As Usual.

Upcoming 2019 Spring Puppet Forums include:

April 10: Holy Puppets: Performing Objects in the Middle Ages with Michelle Oing

From puppets of Christ to fire-breathing dragons, the medieval world was full of performing objects. In this talk, art historian Michelle Oing explores the ways in which puppets were used in late-medieval European culture to understand humanity’s place in the cosmos.

May 1: Wayang Puppet Theatre of Indonesia: Collective Creativity and Individual Agency with Matthew Cohen

This talk, illustrated by puppets from the unmatched Dr. Walter Angst and Sir Henry Angest Collection of Indonesian Puppets at Yale University Art Gallery, explores the dynamics of collective and individual agency in wayang during the colonial and postcolonial periods as a reflex of the changing world.

Admission to this event is free (donations greatly appreciated!), and refreshments will be served. Come early, and experience our puppet exhibitions, as well as the video resources in our library nook. Forums will be broadcast via Facebook Live. For more information, or if you require an accommodation to attend a forum, please contact Ballard Institute staff at 860.486.8580 or bimp@uconn.edu. For more information about UConn Gives, visit givingday.uconn.edu.

Due to the snow, the Ballard Institute will open at 1 p.m. on Saturday, March 2.

Tickets for “The Three Little Pigs” by Liz Joyce & A Couple of Puppets are now SOLD OUT! Get your tickets to our other upcoming Spring Series performances at bimp.ticketleap.com.

For its first installment of the 2019 Spring Puppet Forum Series, the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry at the University of Connecticut will host Choose the Path of Creation: Art and Life of the Independent Theater Maker on Wednesday Feb. 20 at 7 p.m. at the Ballard Institute Theater, located at 1 Royce Circle in Downtown Storrs.

Drawing from her own exceptional career and artistic path, puppeteer and singer Yael Rasooly will look with a candid eye at the liberation of the imagination, and at the practical and mundane aspects of a challenging and rewarding profession and life style. The focus of the talk will tune into the intricate and rich medium of visual theater and puppetry, as a source of self-expression and inner development of an artist.

Yael Rasooly is one of Israel’s prominent independent theater makers. She specializes in contemporary visual and object theater and has directed several Internationally acclaimed performances, both in Israel and Europe, which have been performed in over 30 countries worldwide. Yael was the international guest artist at the 2018 National Puppetry Conference at the Eugene O’Neill Theater Center in Waterford, CT. Yael Rasooly is also a singer of international reputation and her cabaret performance, Glamour in the Dark, is currently touring around the world. Yael Rasooly’s work in the United States is supported by the Israel Institute’s Visiting Israeli Artists Program.

Admission to this event is free (donations greatly appreciated!), and refreshments will be served. Come early, and experience our puppet exhibitions, as well as the video resources in our library nook. Forums will be broadcast via Facebook Live. For more information, or if you require an accommodation to attend a forum, please contact Ballard Institute staff at 860.486.8580 or bimp@uconn.edu.

The Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry and the UConn Puppet Arts Program will present the 2019 UConn Winter Puppet Slam on Friday, Feb. 22, 2019 at 8 p.m. in UConn’s Doris & Simon Konover Auditorium in the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center located at 405 Babbidge Road, Storrs, CT 06269. The UConn Winter Puppet Slam will feature short works by professional puppeteers and performers from around New England, including New York City’s Kate Brehm and Boston’s Harry LaCoste, as well as new works by students and faculty from UConn’s School of Fine Arts. 

The 2019 UConn Winter Puppet Slam will feature work by New York-based movement director Kate Brehm, who devises visual theater with puppets and physical acting. She will perform To Be Continued Indefinitely, a toy theater puppet show that presents a minute and finite representation of the infinite cycle of creation and destruction in the universe. Boston puppeteer Harry La Coste will perform Uke Can Do It!, which features a ukelele-playing puppet named Big Red Bernie and audience participation. UConn Puppet Arts Technical Supervisor Paul Spirito will present a live video projection of a toy theater show performed from his seat in the front row. The UConn Winter Puppet Slam will also feature new works by UConn graduate and undergraduate Puppet Arts students, and digital animations by students of Digital Media and Design Professor Anna Lindemann. Funding for the UConn Winter Puppet Slam is made possible in part by the Puppet Slam Network.

The UConn Winter Puppet Slam is free and open to the public; donations are greatly appreciated. Seating is limited and is on a first-come, first-served basis. Doors open at 7:30 p.m. The event will take place in UConn’s Doris & Simon Konover Auditorium in the Thomas J. Dodd Research Center located at 405 Babbidge Road, Storrs, CT 06269. Attendees can park in the South Garage. To locate the South Garage by GPS, use the UConn Bookstore address: 2075 Hillside Road, Storrs, CT 06269. For directions to Konover Auditorium, visit thedoddcenter.uconn.edu/. These performances are recommended for mature audiences. For more information about these performances or if you require an accommodation to attend this event, please contact Ballard Institute staff at 860-486-8580 or bimp@uconn.edu.

As part of its 2019 Spring Puppet Performance Series, the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry at the University of Connecticut is pleased to present The Three Little Pigs by Liz Joyce & A Couple of Puppets of Long Island, New York on Feb. 16, 2019 at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. in the Ballard Institute Theater, located at 1 Royce Circle in Downtown Storrs.

In this version of The Three Little Pigs, BB (a reformed wolf with allergies) sells real estate to the new pigs in town. This puppet show by acclaimed Long Island puppeteer Liz Joyce features hand-carved marionettes, musical numbers, and lots of laughs. This show is 35 minutes and is recommended for ages 3+.

A Couple of Puppets is actually a lot of puppets and a bunch of wonderful puppet shows. The company was created in 1990 by Liz Joyce. Since then, over 25 shows for children and their families have been brought to life. Themes such as growing things and saving the environment, along with classic fairy tales with a twist, have been added to the company’s long list of puppet shows. Shows are performed live with music and hand-crafted puppets. In the early stages of her career, Liz worked with and apprenticed with Terry Snyder, a master puppeteer from Richmond, Va. Her artistic approach to puppetry has also been influenced by European puppetry traditions and the eccentric energy of New York’s downtown performance artists. She honed her carving skills working with traditional puppet carvers in Prague, Czech Republic, and often collaborates with other puppeteers in the international puppet community. 

Ticket Prices: Adults: $12; Members/Seniors: $10; Students: $8; Kids: $6 (12 years and under).

Tickets can be purchased in advance at the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry, by calling 860-486-8580, or online at bimp.ticketleap.com. A surcharge will be added to any purchases made online. Tickets may also be purchased at the Ballard Institute on the day of performance starting at 10 a.m. There will be open seating and no reservations. Visitors can park in the Storrs Center Garage located at 33 Royce Circle. Parking is free for the first two hours and $1 per hour thereafter, with a daily maximum charge of $8. For more information about these performances or if you require an accommodation to attend this event, please contact Ballard Institute staff at 860-486-8580 or bimp@uconn.edu.

Due to inclement weather, the Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry will be closed on Tuesday, 2/12. Stay warm!

Due to inclement weather, the Ballard Institute will be closed on Sunday, 1/20. Stay warm!