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- Volume 8, Issue 1, 2020
Applied Theatre Research - Volume 8, Issue 1, 2020
Volume 8, Issue 1, 2020
- Editorial
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Applied puppetry: Communities, identities, transgressions
Authors: Laura Purcell-Gates and Matt SmithThis editorial outlines the scope of this special issue on puppetry. The issue editors introduce articles that theorize the use of puppets for a purpose and present dialogues with practitioners working in the field. The authors emphasize the power of puppetry within contemporary cultural systems and the plethora of diverse practices comprising applied puppetry. The lively and developing field of applied puppetry is presented as involving new thinking and methods that have been adopted globally. The editorial argues that applied puppetry, as well as being a set of practices that can affect the lives of participants, is also a robust academic field. The authors hope for a reconsideration of objects in applied theatre practice generally, as a way to further understand networks in socially engaged performance practices.
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- Articles
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‘Objects with Objectives’: Applied puppetry from practice into theory
By David GrantThis article draws on the dialogue between puppetry and applied drama that arose from the AHRC Objects with Objectives Research Network in 2017–18 to explore a tentative theory of applied puppetry. A range of theoretical approaches to applied drama are examined in the light of practical examples of applied puppetry using case studies from Northern Ireland, South Africa and Australia. Morton (2013) highlights how, in performance ‘tension between the material puppet and the imagined puppet’ gives rise to a kind of ‘double vision’ (Tillis 1992), a concept that the article considers alongside Gallagher’s (2005) distinction between body image and body schema, Brecht’s (1974) V-effekt, Meyerhold’s (1998) distinction between the materiality and agency of the actor and Boal’s (1992) idea of metaxis. The article concludes that the distancing and conductive qualities of applied puppetry often work in parallel and that the puppet can be seen as the site of metaxis when used in an applied context.
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On the 10-year anniversary of the Barrydale Giant Puppet Parade South Africa: A conversation between parade creative directors Aja Marneweck and Sudonia Kouter
More Less2020 marks the tenth anniversary of the Barrydale Giant Puppet Parade, a large-scale, experimental annual public puppetry event and performance in a small rural town in the Klein Karoo of South Africa. This multifaceted, collaborative puppet theatre-making process, which results annually in the creation of a parade and large-scale original performance, is co-organized by Net Vir Pret (a children’s school aftercare non-profit organisation based in the town of Barrydale) and the Laboratory of Kinetic Objects (LoKO) at the Centre for Humanities Research at the University of the Western Cape (CHR@UWC). The following conversation between the author (a Theatre Research Fellow at the CHR@UWC and creative director of the parade since 2014) and Sudonia Kouter (the Net vir Pret Aftercare manager and a key artistic contributor in the parade creative and directing teams) explores some of the experiences of meaning-making that arise in such a multi-layered and ambitious project.
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A grotesque act of ventriloquism: Raising and objectifying the dead on stage
More LessAs a real-life figure who was extensively written about in medical journals after his death, but whose voice is entirely absent from the historical record, the character of Tarrare presents the theatre-maker with a number of ethical and artistic considerations. In documenting Tarrare’s life through puppetry and opera, Wattle and Daub engaged in both a literal and a metaphorical act of ventriloquism, wherein we put our own words into the mouths of the dead. Drawing on Levinas’s ethics of the ‘other’ and Salverson’s reflections on the ethics of documentary theatre, this article interrogates The Depraved Appetite of Tarrare the Freak as an example of documentary theatre and explores the unique opportunities and challenges presented when using puppetry to represent the historical ‘other’.
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Puppetry for building bridges: Psychosocial intervention in emergency settings in the Middle East
More LessThis article describes the application of puppetry to psychosocial support during the Syrian crisis since 2011. After many years of using applied puppetry with vulnerable populations, such as refugees and victims of military actions, the author developed a structured model of intervention, as well as a training programme on puppetry, as a medium of expression and communication for activists (social workers, psychologists, artists), allowing them to work with refugees and displaced people. This model is based on a psychosocial approach aimed at strengthening the resilience of the final beneficiaries. The article includes a detailed description of the training steps and techniques involved, linking them to concepts and theoretical background.
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‘Breath, Belief, Focus, Touch’: Applied puppetry in simulated role-play for person-centred nursing education
Authors: Karl Tizzard-Kleister and Matt JenningsAs a subject area that sustains itself on the productive tension between human and non-human agency, applied puppetry is a pragmatic and compelling approach to considering the role of objects in an anthropocentric world. In health care, mannequins play the role of simulated patients. Most often, they simply stand in for the body of the patient. However, this misses the potential that the materiality of these objects holds when considered through applied puppetry terms. This article examines examples of puppetry used in simulated role-play (SRP) for training and assessment, including a specific project involving applied puppetry with person-centred nursing (PCN) students at Ulster University (UU). It attempts to theorize how, when used in this way, applied puppetry is a metaphorical and translational act of anthropomorphism – a process by which an object can ‘become’ more than a thing. In this context, we seek to define a practice in which a mannequin fulfils its potential as a puppet-patient in SRP for PCN students.
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Applied theatre, puppetry and emotional skills in healthcare: A cross-disciplinary pedagogical framework
Authors: Persephone Sextou, Anatoli Karypidou and Eleni Kourtidou-SextouArtists such as actors and puppeteers in health care face emotional challenges in their work. This article investigates the interpersonal competencies and emotional skills of the artist who uses puppets in their practice in health-care contexts and settings. We present initial findings from phase B of a wider longitudinal study. Phase A focused on actors in hospitals and drama trainees; Phase B uses qualitative research methods with actors, puppeteers and therapists as participants. Content analysis of data reveals that the main competencies the artist needs to deal with emotional incidents in health care are empathy, self- and social awareness, self-care, self-reflection, emotional resilience and active listening. These skills are needed alongside acting and puppetry skills to develop competent and professional artists in healthcare. The study offers evidence to further develop strategies of receiving, processing and communicating emotions safely and effectively within the protection of the artform. This study therefore diverts our attention from traditional training courses that are mainly about learning artistic skills to a cross-disciplinary pedagogical framework that aims to enable artists to observe, reflect and process emotions before, during and after a performance with patients as theatre ‘audience’-participants.
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The art of expressive objects supporting agency in palliative care
More LessI have been developing a model for how to use animated objects when meeting a palliative care patient and I have noticed that during these animated moments in the hospice, performing objects have represented different sites of humanity. At their best, these moments have created a performance from the patient’s story that has become shared. Moments of animation in the hospice are meetings between me and a person who is in palliative care. I have facilitated our meeting and brought a suitcase full of everyday objects with me. A patient is given a story and then cast in their own story with objects they have chosen. Meetings with patients in palliative care made me think about patients moral agency. A moral agent is a being who consciously puts moral activities into practice. Expressive objects telling stories for a patient is one place where moral agency survives in the hospice setting and where a palliative care patient can act for a while as a member of a moral community. In this article, I share my model of expressive objects related to my practice.
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Breaking out of time: Dafa Puppet Theatre
Authors: Husam Abed and Réka DeákDafa Puppet Theatre works with refugee communities to enable expression and change people’s lives through puppetry. Dafa’s work is on the boundaries of visual arts, puppetry, music, family gathering, food and a range of different elements. The idea of the puppet is something that you can touch and sense, yet it is on the borders between reality and fiction. There is always the possibility that the gates of imagination can be opened by this object, which can have many symbolic meanings. In this article, a reflection transcribed from an interview with Laura Purcell-Gates, Husam and Réka discuss their work with puppetry in communities. They reflect on layers of meaning within the puppet, working with specific materials and found objects, the importance of cultural specificity in their approach to the work, decolonizing practices of puppetry and building community through integrating puppetry, gatherings and shared food. This artistic discussion is an insight into a very active company working with often vulnerable and displaced communities.
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Shadow theatre and older people
More LessFor five years now, Stichting Droomtheater has been producing interdisciplinary puppet theatre and organizing presentations and workshops featuring shadow theatre. In conjunction with various narrative techniques, this ancient Chinese art form offers great possibilities for small-scale theatre shows and workshops for special target groups. The audiences are easily captured, fascinated and motivated to participate in the creative, interactive sessions following the theatre shows.
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Community puppetry in Ireland
By Karen TorleyIn this artist statement, Karen Torley explores the context of professional puppetry in the community. She provides an outline about how she introduces puppetry to a group setting with care and sensitivity. She presents her important methods that activate a puppet and describes how she has used these throughout her practice. Her approach emphasizes the connection of breath, belief, focus and touch (BBFT). She also describes how her work can connect to people with some anecdotal examples of puppetry in communities.
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Trazmallo Ixinti and applied puppetry in Mexico: An interview
More LessIn this artist reflection, Daniel Loyola explores the context of puppetry in relation to storytelling and communities in Mexico. He leads the reader through his company’s use of puppetry in explorations of ritual and the influences of Mexican para-theatrical traditions. He presents puppetry methods as part of a combination of artforms and practices, and discusses how his company has used these collaborative practices, an approach that emphasizes the connection to ideas from animism and pre-modern ideas about the power of objects. He also describes how the work is challenged by the context of communities dealing with violence and uncertainties in rural Mexico.
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