upatreearts

Situated in a natural amphitheatre, beneath the rolling mountains of the pristine D’Aguilar range just outside of Samford on the Northside of Brisbane, this boutique 24 hour music and camping festival is a fun place for puppets to dance and make merry. With a constant stream of great music City Chic and Earth puppts were able to embrace the festival spirit and have a great time. Looking forward to future years of a fantastic local music festival.

On a beach somewhere in Spring Swell really! What a show! Awesome creatures – four giant puppets, shy at first, and curious, tip-toeing onto a white sandy beach. Sniffing the ocean air, stepping slowly, silently, they suddenly sensed something…….. something special, something peculiar – something …… like themselves. Along the foreshore they saw fascinating objects – things of beauty and intrigue…. Sculptures on the beach! Earth, Water, Forest and City Puppets….. pranced, paraded, played pranks and pirouetted with the sculptures. They danced, they stood captivated, they pondered – they created poetic visions with these beautiful creations carved from the hands and hearts of artists. On a lazy Currumbin beach in Spring 2010, the puppets had entered the world of the Swell Sculpture Festival …….. They were never to be the same again……. Swell Sculpture Festival 2010 –see the photos in the gallery.

Yesterday two of the Puppets, earth man and water dude, set forth in the big city and strutted their stuff with a collection of the Brisbanes marching and brass bands.  It was a lot of fun especially the contrast between the precision of the marching bands and some of the kooky wild marching happening with the puppets. We had two amazing puppet band leaders who drew many smiles from the crowd during the whole performance. Nothing took away from the fantastic sight of the two puppets cruising down the mall and kicking up their heels in King George Square.

photos to come

Today our new puppet trailer is ready to pick up! Thanks to the Community Benefit Gambling Fund the puppets can now travel in style with the delivery of a shiny new green trailer complete with roofracks and tool box.

Now for the big question…who can back a trailer?

Its Christmas time again which means the puppets favourite Santa Parade at Strathpine. Much Fun was had by all at this annual event.

Thankyou to all those members who participated in the Anna Yen theatre workshop. I thought it was an amazing day. I was pushed way out of my comfort zone and survived, learnt a few things about myself, felt very connected to all of the people that were there and was inspired to try and incorporate what we
learnt into our performing. I am very tired today on all levels but it
was well worth it.

NEW puppets, we have four new spirit of country puppets: earth, rainforest, and water and city spirits. Made possible by a Q150 grant they premiered at the opening ceremony of the International Community Development Conference at the Brisbane convention centre.

Forest, Earth, City and Water looked fantastic and were well recieved byu conference patrons.

Thankyou so much Nancy Brown for teaching us so much and inspiring us to make some fantastic material for our new community spirit puppets.

With the help of so many of the Mt Nebo and Mt Glorious community we made some edgy black and white city scapes. Intricate and beautiful linoprint sea scales. Jungle print mountain style and the amazing sun printing for a desert scene.

With the edgy art of ironing well on display and some fabulous food a good weekend was had by all.

Now to the sewing…..

Maleny
Co-op artists worked with groups of teenagers to create giant lanterns as part of their exploration of spirituality.

The puppets hit the big time when performing at the Gold Coast Convention Centre with Lee Kernighan in support. An enthusiastic crowd keen to congo kept puppeteers on their toes throughout their performance.

Brisbane City Council Library Project
Co-op artists worked on a two-month project at Bracken Ridge library, where puppetry workshops formed part of a cross-generational collaborative performance between writers, historians, crafts people and young people in the community. Community members and co-op artists collaborated on a short narrative, script, poem and music. Characters were derived from this work which then became puppets, lanterns and masked performers – these made their appearance at a celebratory day and festival.

The second part of this project saw artists head to the sea where they worked with the Wynum community on their story. The artists helped workshop participants uncover themes they wished to explore with their creations. Community members wrote a series of narratives, one of which was selected by the group as the performance piece – Ooooze! Pandemonium at Pandanus. Co-op musicians and creative locals developed an accompanying musical sound scape. The culmination of this two-month project was a giant puppet performance, which were later joined by the lanterns in a parade that was a highlight of the Wynum Spring Festival.

Co-op members were invited by the Brisbane International Film Festival to run lantern-making workshops for families at South Bank. The co-op designed a series of lantern-making kits to ensure there was something for all ages – from simple lanterns for small children to more complicated stars and butterflies. The lanterns (and lantern makers) joined the giant puppets and the co-op band for a romp around the Piazza after sundown.

Co-op puppeteers and members of the Bracken Ridge community joined together for ‘A Bird’s Eye View’. Puppeteers and musicians told the story of Bracken Ridge’s history through the eyes of the Jabiru.

2005-2006

The giant puppets were in the thick of it daily at Woodford with the giant snake and community spirit puppets, along with the co-op band, delighting festival goers daily.

The puppets wowed a crowd of thousands as they lead the street parade into the Festival of Light event.

The begining of it all the first spirit puppets….