Hello!

Well, it's been a while! Life has been extreeeeemely busy for me since we last caught up. I mentioned in my last post that I had met the wonderful Imogen Di Sapia, founder of Bright Moon Theatre. Well, a group of like-minded, mostly Brighton based folk started meeting at Imogen's studio for a monthly Puppet Circle, and the long and short of it is, that together we cooked up a dark and beautiful collection of Halloween inspired puppetry pieces, which became a show called The Crossing. We performed this at the absolutely delightful Bom Banes in Brighton. If you are within travelling distance of Brighton but have never been to Bom Banes, I insist you stop what you are doing and make every effort to go there as soon as possible. It's the quirkiest, most special little jewel you will come across for a very long time. It's...it's...oh just go there. You'll see what I mean.

For those that are still here...my own portion of the show was a retelling of Bluebeard. Re writing a folk tale for puppet theatre, making the puppets, devising directions and sounds...oh I learnt so much, with lots of help from my Bright Moon friends. I must say, not being a willing performer, I almost didn't go through with it. But I am so glad I did - it was a fab evening, and our little audience did seem to enjoy themselves. I had expert puppeteering from Imogen, Lily Waugh and Katie Lenton. Here are a couple of pics - of the puppets themselves and of them in action on the evening.

It would have been a shame to end it there, so we performed again, with extra music and storytelling, at the incredibly beautiful (and sadly to be bulldozed for development) Zu Studios in Lewes.

Anyway I feel you have heard more than enough from me for one day...but I have two treats for you for tomorrow! I will show you how I created the creepy Steampunk-inspired forbidden chamber (as seen above)...and I will share some thrilling news, too!

Inspiration

Hello, poor, neglected blog! Although I don't have any of my work to show at the moment I have still been busy, creatively. (I promise!)

I recently spent a very inspirational day with the goodly folk at the Little Angel Theatre, where I did a course in Writing For Puppetry. It was a brilliant day, and I met some really talented, fabulous people. Most excitingly, I met the lovely Imogen Di Sapia, who has recently started up the Bright Moon Theatre Company. Being only a stone's throw from me in Brighton, we really hope to work together soon! I am planning to make a new puppet, which if all goes well will make her debut on Halloween night…

Yesterday, I went to ELCAF, the East London Comic and Arts Fair. I have missed it every year until now and kicked myself, but at last I made it, and very splendid it was too. Although I have never made a comic/zine it's something I really want to do. Comics people are so lovely, I find, and it was nice to see some of the people I have only so far seen online. I bought a comic by the super talented Isabel Greenberg, whose book The Encyclopaedia of Early Earth is one of my favourite ever books. I also bought one of Philippa Rice's lovely books - she is as nice as she seems in her book! I really enjoyed seeing Viviane Schwarz doing cat portraits of people…was far too shy to get one myself though! Finally I went to a talk by Jillian Tamaki, which was so great…I just want ALL of her books, right now!

My only regret of the day was NOT buying this absolutely scrummy toast plate...

 

I kept going back and looking longingly at it but I didn't have much money and had only planned on buying books, and was all confused to suddenly be desperate for a plate. I was a fool! I want it so badly! It's made by Charlotte Mei, who I very much wish had done a hard sell! (But was far too nice for that!)

In other news, I recently applied for a job which involved having a one and a half hour Skype meeting. This made me realise that I am in fact hideous and haggard, and am very thankful that my friends and family have stuck by me despite this.