Puppetry Designs for Sight Specific Warehouse (BDA_US28)
     
The designs I created for The Birds Scenofest project are based on initial internal response that I had after reading the text.  I felt that the world that Aristophanes created was a little scary like a weird and vivid dream. I used the surreal imagery to create a world that was someplace in the shadows between a dream and a nightmare. Because of these reactions to the text I felt that experimental puppetry designs for a site-specific warehouse with open beam construction would be fascinating.  The first of the images that I am sending is a materials inspired set; it is a model I built that represents an impression of what the world of my design would look like. 
All of the puppet creatures are designed as hand carved and found object media.  The puppets would accentuate the fantastic, and sometimes scary qualities that Aristophanes play exhibits.   Raw materials such as wire, wood, wax, felt, and paper would make this world rough cut and exaggerated in a way that is amusing and a little creepy. 
 Another way that I worked within the dreamscape was scale.  It seemed the most natural of the design principals with which to experiment for creating a strange land in the sky.  The puppets use differing scales from ½ scale rod puppet to 2X scale puppet with stilts and other armatures.  This transforms the ordinary relationship between birds and humans and opens it up for enchanting things to happen.
Overall, I wanted the execution of this puppet design to exhibit the raw and organic quality with all spirit and imagination of Aristophanes text.
 		  
 
 
 
Sarah Gahagan , USA  
University of Oregon