Wondering how to include puppetry in your Summer fun plans? Check out some of the amazing festivals happening throughout the country:
The National Puppetry Festival – July 12-17, Atlanta, GA
The 2011 National Puppetry Festival celebrating its 75th Anniversary as the premiere puppetry event in the United States. Since 1937, the Puppeteers of America has presented festivals to spotlight the best in puppetry in all its forms. The National Puppetry Festival is held every two years and brings together puppeteers and friends from around the world to study, share, inspire, enlighten, entertain, and be entertained.
Featuring:
- Hobgoblin Hill Puppets – “The Temptation of St. Anthony”
- Frogtown Mountain Puppeteers – “The Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow”
- Corbian Arts – *”Darwin the Dinosaur” (2009 Family Grant )
- Center for Puppetry Arts – “Cinderella Della Circus”
- Randel McGee Productions – “You Can Learn a Lot from a Bug!”
- Clay Martin’s Puppet Theater – “Penny Dreadful – An Evening of Gothic Horror”
- Great Arizona Puppet Theater – “Cinderella”
- Puppet Art Theater Company – “Goldilocks and the Three Sharks”
- Blair Thomas & Co. – “Pictures at an Exhibition”
- The Melchior Marionettes – “An Evening with The Melchior Marionettes: Three Women, Three Mothers, Three Puppeteers”
- The Rough House – “Icthyodyssey: A Fish Puppet Rock Opera”
- Tears of Joy Theatre – “Little One-Inch”
- Center for Puppetry Arts – “The Ghastly Dreadfuls”
Plus workshops, films, Puppet Cabaret, Puppet Potpourri, and more!
PuppetFest MidWest – July 5-10, Trenton, MO
The purpose of PuppetFest MidWest is to promote, encourage and illustrate by example and by hands-on experience good puppet theatre. At the festival, you will be treated to world-class puppet performances in an intimate setting, and you will participate in a 4 day in-depth workshop, taught by one of the professional puppeteers performing at the festival. You will learn skills and techniques from some of the best puppeteers performing today.
This year offers performances and workshops from Drew Allison, Nick Barone, Luman Coad, Pam Corcoran, Art Grueneberger, Phillip Huber, Kurt Hunter, Monica Loe, Randel McGee, Paul Mesner and Pix Smith!
Banners & Cranks, A Cantastoria Festival – June 22-26, New York, NY
Pre-Cinematic technology takes over The Dorothy B. WIlliams Theatre at HERE for a week of conteporary cantastoria, cooked up by puppeteers, artists & craftspeople from across the country. A millenium-old art form is rejuvenated & re-imagined, as performers animate paintings & banners with puppets, sung texts, jokes, songs & stories.
Featuring: The Dolly Wagglers, Great Small Works, Peter Schumann, Chinese Theater Works, Possibilitarian Puppet & Mask Theater, Mout of the Wolf, Sam Wilson, Chinese Theater Works, Ramshackle Enterprises, Soozin Hirschmugl, Theater Oobleck, The Bros. Harrell, Olive & Orlando Brecht, Adam Ende, Hermine Ortega, Care Dolan, Redwing Blackbird Theater, Hermine Ortega, More of Everything, VSA VT’s Awareness Theater Co., Awareness Theater Co., and The Whiskey Spitters
Sunday June 19 – Opening Celebration – Free & Open to the public
Brooklyn Bridge Park, Pier 1 – DUMBO Brooklyn
4:00pm-7:30pm
Featuring: The Dolly Wagglers, Great Small Works, Theater Oobleck, Chinese Theater Works, Possibilitarian Puppet & Mask Theater, and the Greatest Smallest Band