Mark Sanders Among contemporary artists, William Kentridge is notable for having worked across multiple media. Of particular note are the ways in which the techniques of his animated films intersect with elements from his collaborations in puppet theatre with Handspring Puppet Company, and how his ideas about automaticity reveal puppetry as a condition of possibility both for filmmaking and for the drawing that, in Kentridge’s filmic work, underpins his Drawings for Projection (1989-2020). Tracing these intersections and ideas, this essay asserts the relevance of anamorphosis as an explanatory concept. Mark Sanders is Professor of Comparative Literature and English at New …
Category: Articles
Women and Masks: Reflections on a Conference, a Project, and a Field
Felice Amato During 2021-22, we held a year-long virtual conference entitled “Women and Masks: A Transdisciplinary Arts-Research Conference” through Boston University. This report provides insights into the four weekends of virtual events, which featured presenters from around the world who offered a diverse range of content and experiential opportunities. The conference was inspired by the organizers’ interest in women’s complex experiences with mask practices. It highlighted the paradoxical potential of masks, often revealing the political and cultural narratives surrounding women. The intersection of these two themes exposed both exclusions and acts of agency while illuminating the complex phenomena related to …
Founders of the Field: Nancy Lohman Staub
Bradford Clark This is a profile of Nancy Staub, the founder of the Worlds of Puppetry Museum at the Center for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta, Georgia. The article traces her contributions to world puppetry from the 1950s to the present day. As a performer, director, producer, researcher, and collector, she has collaborated with international puppet artists (including Jim Henson) and scholars to bring awareness of puppet theatre to a wider audience. The article includes a selected bibliography of her publications. Bradford Clark is a professor in the Department of Theatre and Film at Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio, …
Modernism in Tholpavakoothu: Analyzing Contemporary Productions
Rahul Koonathara Tholpavakoothu is a shadow puppet play of Kerala, South India, performed in Hindu temples in specially constructed puppet playhouses called koothumadam. It narrates the whole Kamparamayanam, the Ramayana text by the twelfth-century Tamil Poet Kampan (1180–1250 CE) to mother goddess Bhagavathy (also Bhagavati). From January to May every year, the tale of Rama and Ravana’s fight is presented through songs and dialogues by puppeteers using leather puppets. Performances start each night after a set of opening rituals and go on till early morning. These performances are highly spiritual and done as an offering to the mother goddess. This …
The Dissenting Paper in Zero-COVID China
Zhixuan Zhu This article explores how paper became a tool of political dissent in Chinese people’s protests against the government’s authoritarian policies of “zero-COVID” and their collateral humanitarian crises. Paper took center stage in two incidents in 2022: the Chinese college students’ “cardboard dog zeal” during campus lockdown and the national protest/vigil known as the “white paper movement” or “A4 revolution.” In analyzing the two cases, I reveal how quotidian entities transform into puppets and performing objects that empower political expressions with their inherent materiality. Zhixuan Zhu is a PhD student in Theatre and Performance at the Graduate Center, City …
Puppetry Power: Puppetry Doubling Techniques in Portraying the Painful Past
Achinoam Aldouby Theatrical representations of history have a profound influence on the emotional connection of audiences to the past while shaping their perception of events. This paper delves into the aesthetic choices employed in portraying traumatic history, focusing on the utilization of what I am calling “the puppetry doubling technique,” which creates a distinctive reflective aesthetic, distinguishing past experiences from the way they are remembered. By presenting protagonists as both puppets and puppeteers, these performances create a space for reflection, enabling the audience to engage with the past in a meaningful way that often transcends the impact of vivid documentary …
Puppet Matters: New Materialism and Ecocriticism in Contemporary Puppetry
Kathy Foley New Materialism, Thing Theory, and Ecocriticism are affecting current performance and lead to productions like The Plastic Bag Store (2020) by Robin Frohardt, Chimpanzee (2019) by Nick Lehane, Aanika’s Elephants by Annie Evans, and PackRat by Renee Philippi. This focus on material as living brings thoughtful attention to puppetry as a discipline, but may merely reinforce what puppeteers already know. While this theory which, linked to climate change, is likely to grow thematically in coming years, can puppetry get us beyond our tendency to demand a human or humanized subject as protagonist? Is it possible to develop a new animism through …
The Name Succession Investitures of the Youki Marionette Family—Interweaving the Old and the New in Edo String Puppetry
Mari Boyd In name succession ceremonies, exhibiting excellence in traditional skills is considered a guarantee of leadership in developing and transmitting the traditional arts. Two new leaders have risen in the Youki marionette family, with differing perspectives evident in their respective celebrations. Isshi IV honored the traditional procedures while Magosaburō XIII included a new play suggesting where the winds of change may take Edo string puppetry. Mari Boyd is professor emeritus at Sophia University, Tokyo. Researcher of modern Japanese theatre including performing objects and intercultural theatre, she is author of Japanese Contemporary Objects, Manipulators, and Actors in Performance (Tokyo: Sophia …
