The Mind Creative March 2014
My experience with puppets in education (which often falls under
the topic of arts education), springs more from practical experiences
rather than theoretical practices. My first initiation into creative
drama and puppetry started in the early 70’s in Ahmedabad at the
Darpana Academy of Performing Arts (in their puppetry division)
under the late Meher Contractor. This was during my student days
at the NID. In later years, while in Stockholm at the marionette
theatre institute, I also had the privilege of being a pedagogue at
Var theatre at Stockholm’s barn Och Ungdoms theatre run by the
social department dealing with Stockholm’s children and youth
theatres.
With Andrew Hansen from Melbourne
It is important to understand that there is puppetry for children and
puppetry with children. The two can be vastly different. The former
could be a production with adults or a pre-planned and rehearsed
performances played for an audience of young persons while the
latter would be creating a performance with children from scratch,
improvising and using materials to create puppets and stories by
the children themselves with some inputs from the group leader a
puppeteer or teacher.
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