Puppet Power Closing Panel - Puppets, Ritual, & Celebration

Join Eric Bass, Kathy Foley, Nicola Levell, Kati Qui, with Moderator Jeremiah Bartram as we look back over the past week at the role inanimate objects have had in rituals, celebrations, ceremonies, and social justice.

Our closing panel will explore some of themes that have arisen as part of Puppet Power: Festival of Ideas and continue asking questions around the role puppets have had in ritual and celebration and the role they can play to help transform and connect humanity.

Accessibility: This live online session will be presented with ASL interpretation and auto-generated English captions.

A bit about the Artists:

Jeremiah Bartram - Moderator - is an Ottawa-based artist and critic who was swept away by the insurrectionary delight of puppet theatre six years ago and has never recovered. More writer than performer, he has attended intensives, festivals and workshops in North America and Europe, fashioned a collection of imaginary beings and provided them with scripts, and is working on a book about puppet theatre. But his main preoccupation is the “why” of puppets: what is the primal source of their power? He holds four degrees, a doctorate in literature from the University of London among them.

Eric Bass, Co-Founded Sandglass Theatre with his wife, Ines Zeller Bass. He has worked for over forty years as a director, playwright, performer and mask and puppet maker. He has worked on four continents and his signature solo work, Autumn Portraits, toured around the world for three decades. Eric toured for six years in the Sandglass production of D-Generation: An Exaltation of Larks, a piece about people with dementia, and continues to travel with Babylon, journeys of refugees, Sandglass’ puppetry and music exploration of the issues of fleeing war and violence and of how asylum seekers are received in a new homeland. Eric served for five years on the board of the Network of Ensemble Theaters. In 2010, he received the Vermont Governor's Award for Excellence in the Arts.

Kathy Foley is a theatre director, scholar, educator, and author with specialization in Indonesian wayang performance. BA in English Literature, MA and PhD in Theatre. Inspired by a workshop with Jacques Lecoq, she began work with puppets and mask. She has curated exhibits of Asian puppets for the East West Center (Honolulu, Hawaii), National Geographic Society, and the Center for Puppetry Arts (Atlanta, Georgia). As the editor of Asian Theatre Journal (since 2003), Foley has helped publish research on puppetry and assisted with translations and editing of Asian entries for UNIMA’s World Encyclopedia of Puppetry Arts.

Nicola Levell is an Associate Professor at University of British Columbia, Anthropology, Author, and Curator, her work focuses on exhibitions, collections history, public and performing arts and storytelling, heritage, memory and art and aesthetics with a focus on multisensorial practices. She has curated exhibitions and art installations in the UK, Portugal, USA, and Canada. Most recently Shadows, Strings and Other Things: The Enchanting Theatre of Puppets, and its digital counterpart won the 2020 Canadian Museum Association’s award for outstanding exhibition of cultural heritage and the 2021 Michael Ames Prize for Innovative Museum Anthropology. Recent books include Bodies of Enchantment: Puppets from Asia, Europe, Africa and the Americas (2021) and the monograph Mischief Making: Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas, Art, and the Seriousness of Play (2021).

Katiuska Quiñones (Kati Qui) is an Artist, Director, Puppeteer and Puppet builder from Curaçao. Founder of Teater di Pòpchi Maletin (2018), creator of Quiuppets, she constantly explores different kinds of puppetry styles to apply back to her work in her own style. Her performances have included themes around true events, connections, bullying, and friendship. Internationally her work has been featured by UNIMA-Netherlands and NYC International online Shadow Slam. A natural connector and strong voice for puppetry, she created a new Caribbean online puppetry program during the pandemic to connect and elevate other local artists.

This event is also available as part of our Puppet Power: Festival of Ideas All Access Pass and Event Recording Package.