New North-East puppet festival

TWO North-East artists, Kerrin Tatman and Will Steele, have secured funding from the Arts Council and The Sundays for Sammy Trust to stage a new festival of puppetry and visual theatre in Newcastle. Moving Parts: Newcastle Puppetry Festival, debuting from March 27 to April 1, will bring substantial talent into the region and give access to this developing art form to local performers and the general public.

Spread across five venues in Newcastle, Moving Parts is offering six days of events including three large-scale productions at Northern Stage, cabaret and fringe shows at Cobalt Studios, four diverse performance masterclasses at Space Six, a six-day puppet making residency course, and children’s puppetry events at Ouseburn Farm along with many other festival events.

The festival is especially geared towards adults, teenagers, emerging artists and professional practitioners, but also extends to children and the wider community.

Northern Stage will host Death Puppet Klezma Jam by Mirth & Misery, a dark comic infusion of gothic marionettes and live Eastern European music; The Marked by Theatre Temoin, mask and physical theatre combine to tackle issues of homelessness and The Seas of Organillo by Stephen Mottram’s Animata – a entrancing exploration into the realms of the unconsciousness. The festival training programme welcomes artists such as Blind Summit Theatre, Nick Barnes and Gavin Glover, offering opportunities to explore puppetry that the region has been missing. Cobalt Studios is the hub of the festival, offering small-scale shows, cabaret acts, live music, short films, exhibitions, and a cafe/bar.

For more information and to book tickets, visit newcastlepuppetryfestival.co.uk

Viv Hardwick