The Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry and the UConn Puppet Arts Program will present the 2020 UConn Winter Puppet Slam on Friday, Feb. 7, 2020 at 8:00 PM in UConn’s von der Mehden Recital Hall, located at 875 Coventry Rd, Storrs, CT. 06269. The 2020 UConn Winter Puppet Slam will feature short works by professional puppeteers and performers from around New England, including BodyWave and Amy West, as well as new works by UConn Puppet Arts students.
The 2020 UConn Winter Puppet Slam will showcase the work of BodyWave, a Boston-based collective of artists and performers who will present The Good Oak, a crankie (or moving scroll performance) inspired by Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac which incorporates live music and over 30 puppets to show the life of one tree over more than a century. Come early to the von der Mehden lobby to see BodyWave’s Miniature Migration, an audience-of-one show about Sandhill Cranes on Nebraska’s Platte River.
Amy West, a puppeteer, alumna of the UConn Puppet Arts certificate program, and a writer, photographer, and wedding DJ from Boston, will perform her new work Coming Home to You, a shadow crankie celebrating the annual Falcon Ridge Folk Festival in the Berkshires.
The 2020 UConn Winter Puppet Slam will also feature new works by UConn graduate and undergraduate students from the university’s Puppet Arts Program. Funding for the 2020 UConn Winter Puppet Slam is made possible in part by the Puppet Slam Network.
The 2020 UConn Winter Puppet Slam is free and open to the public; donations are greatly appreciated. Seating is limited and is on a first-come, first-served basis. Doors open at 7:30 p.m. The event will take place in UConn's von der Mehden Recital Hall located at 875 Coventry Rd, Storrs, Conn. For directions to the von der Mehden Recital Hall, visit vdm.uconn.edu. These performances are recommended for mature audiences. For more information about these performances or if you require an accommodation to attend this event, please contact Ballard Institute staff at 860-486-8580 or bimp@uconn.edu.