Monday, July 12, 2021

Great Small Works Spaghetti Dinner at the International Puppet Fringe Festival


 

Friday, August 13, 2020
8:00 PM

LIVE and FREE for a limited audience!
Live-streamed online for everyone else!

Due to pandemic restrictions, there will NOT be spaghetti.
Live performance will be presented OUTDOORS.

Featuring:

CHINESE THEATRE WORKS
Excerpts from Three-Scale Zhongkui!

BOXCUTTER COLLECTIVE / BREAD AND PUPPET THEATER
Excerpts from The History of Laughter

BRUCE CANNON
Songs from Harlem River Drive

MUSIC BY PIEDMONT BLUZ
Valerie and Benedict Turner

For free tickets:          http://puppetfringenyc.com
For online viewing:     www.facebook.com/GreatSmallWorks

Facebook event: https://www.facebook.com/events/510960066822644

Hosted by your friends at Great Small Works:
John Bell, Trudi Cohen, Stephen Kaplin, Jenny Romaine, Roberto Rossi, Mark Sussman

**************

Piedmont Bluz
Valerie and Benedict Turner
        Piedmont Bluz is an acoustic, husband/wife duo, ambassadors of Country Blues music and the Piedmont style of finger-picking. Their mission is to help preserve these rural, east coast traditions by educating audiences about this unique aspect of African American culture through musical entertainment.



Boxcutter Collective / Bread and Puppet Theater
        Excerpts from The History of Laughter, a collaboration between Peter Schumann of the Bread and Puppet Theater and Boxcutter Collective (including Lindsay McCaw), initially created during a 3-week residency in spring of 2021. The History of Laughter looks at the role of fear in our society, and how the transcendent power of fools can subvert the crumbling empire and empower the masses to create something new instead. With appearances by Mikhail Bakhtin, Gargantua, the Suffering Valley, Santa Claus, and Satan!
        Boxcutter Collective is comprised of four core members: Sam Wilson, Jason Hicks, Tom Cunningham and Joe Therrien, with an extended family of puppeteers, painters, performers, builders, educators, workers, union organizers, and mischief makers who have been working together in various forms for the last 15 years. You can find them creating and performing original High-Art, Low-Concept political puppet shows in New York City regularly, appearing at The Jalopy Theater and Coney Island USA and beyond! They are currently working on a commission from Handmade Puppet Dreams to create a short film.


Bruce Cannon
        Songs from Harlem River Drive, which celebrates the history and diversity of one of the most famous neighborhoods in the world. Harlem.
        Bruce Cannon is Artistic Director for the Swedish Cottage of Marionette Theater and the President of the Puppetry Guild of Greater New York.



Chinese Theatre Works
        Excerpts from 3-Scale Zhongkui!  -- The Chinese Judge of Hell brings Justice to the Lower East Side. 
        Yuling Fang as Chinese Opera Zhongkui
        Jing Shan as Hand Puppet Zhongkui
        Stephen Kaplin and Harrison Greene as Giant Puppet Zhongkui
        Chinese Theatre Works, co-directed by Kuang-Yu Fong and Stephen Kaplin, brings together Chinese and Western performance styles and techniques. Its programs cut across ethnic and cultural boundaries and aim at sparking interest in Chinese cultural traditions among the wider public, as well as in Chinese Americans who have not had access to this part of their heritage.
















Friday, July 2, 2021

Roberto Rossi Offers Toy Theater Workshop(s)

Roberto will conduct sessions throughout the summer through the Chicago International Puppet Theater Festival.

Session 1: Monday, July 12 - Sunday, July 18, 2021 

Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday
7:00 - 9:00 PM Central Time

Toy Theater 1 (Level 1) introduction to the form, the basic skills concluding with a showing.  Make your first toy theater stage using recyclable materials.  Learn conceptual and design approaches in building an original work. Build basic jointed 2D puppets and moveable set pieces and discover the unique theatrical language of the Toy Theater. 

Sign up here:

Session 2: Monday, July 26 - Sunday, August 1, 2021

Toy Theater 2 (Level 2)
Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday
7:00 - 9:00 PM Central Time

Sign up here:
https://www.chicagopuppetfest.org/online-workshops/toy-theater-ii-session-2-july-26-august-1-with-roberto-rossi/

Session 3: Monday, August 9 - Sunday, August 15, 2021

Toy Theater 2 (Level 2)

Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday
7:00 - 9:00 PM Central Time
Sign up here:
https://www.chicagopuppetfest.org/online-workshops/toy-theater-ii-session-3-august-9-15-with-roberto-rossi/





Friday, May 28, 2021

We Remember: A Community Covid Memorial

 lease join us on June 8th, 2021 at 6pm for “We Remember: A Community Covid Memorial” Dedication and Activation at Green-Wood Cemetery (5th Ave & 25th Street Entrance, Brooklyn, NY). Twenty NYC community groups are coming together to create a memorial honoring those lost to Covid-19. Join us on June 8 as we honor our dead through music and dance, create a shared space for reflection, and complete the memorial, which will remain up for the month of June.

 
Featuring performance and offerings by:

La Troupe Makandal,
Aeilushi Mistry
Winston "Jeggae" Hoppie,
Mazarte & the Villalobos Brothers, 
Judith Berkson, 
Monica Hope & Kelvyn Bell,
and Brooklyn Roots Lullaby Project.
 
FB event for dedication
https://fb.me/e/EM9YVvZY

With Gratitude,
 
Jenny from Great Small Works / Naming The Lost Memorials
 
naming the lost

Naming the Lost Memorials  is a small team of volunteer artists, activists, and folklorists who have lost loved ones, neighbors, and co-workers to Covid-19. In response to the ever-accumulating numbers of deceased, we have been creating memorial sites in New York City to name and remember victims of the Covid-19 pandemic. Our work began in May 2020. Now we’ve passed the first anniversary since the first Covid deaths occurred in the United States and the pandemic continues to take lives daily. We know that grieving and mourning are far from finished, even as vaccination brings hope. Our intention is to continue the necessary process of mournfully and respectfully naming those lost to COVID. The virus continues to claim lives and we are continuing the work of creating memorial sites to name and honor the lost.  
Visit our website for helpful instructions and other examples of memorials that we and others have made:
 
https://namingthelost.com/memorials/

List of Community Partners Contributing to the Memorial--  
Hebrew Tabernacle 
Fort Tryon Jewish Center
Flushing Town Hall
Inside Change Arts: Bowery Resident Street Artists & The 5th Grade Formulators of the Bedford Village School 
Building Stories
Bronx Documentary Center
Mazarte Dance Company Inc.
Brooklyn Roots
Guyana Cultural Association of New York
Bangladesh Institute of Performing Arts (BIPA)
Makandal: Bridging the Past and the Future of Traditional Haitian Arts  Teachers and Writers Collaborative
Mixteca
Academy of Medical and Public Health Services
The Center For Family Life
JouvayFest
Collective Mano a Mano: Mexican Culture Without Borders
Worker Justice Project
Caring Majority      

 
namingthelost 2

Co-Produced/ Funded by Green-wood Foundation, Great Small Works, City Lore, Circus Amok, NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, National Endowment for the Arts Folk Arts Program, CATCH (Center for Art, Tradition, and Cultural Heritage)