The Curators:
Sarah Provost
JANE CATHERINE SHAW began working with puppetry in Atlanta, Georgia at the Center for Puppetry Arts over twenty years ago. As a puppeteer there she gave over 2000 performances. She curated the Center's XPT and FTW workshops for two years, co-authored the original main stage production Dinosaurs, and created three Family shows for the Center's museum theatre. One of these shows, a one woman show using found object puppetry--Folktales of Asia and Africa-- is featured in this year's Voice 4 Vision Puppet Festival.
In New York, Ms. Shaw created The Lone Runner, a work that premiered at La Mama in 1999, by invitation of Ellen Stewart, its founder. Also premiered at La Mama are: Bed of Light - developed through the Arts at St. Anns Puppet Lab and through a grant from HERE's Dream Music Program. And, Universe Expanding -developed through Mabou Mines RAP program and with a grant from the Jim Henson Foundation
As part of La Mama E.T.C., Ms. Shaw traveled to Turkey to create Youth Without Age, Life Without Death which featured various puppet styles and scales. She has also accompanied Ms Stewart and Theodora Skipitares to India to participate in the Ishara Puppet Festival in New Delhi. She has recently returned from Albania where she collaborated with a fellow artist in the development of a new work there. In November 2009 she joins Inkfish Art Productions in London as they premiere their work The Brain at The Little Angel Theater, for its Suspense Festival.
Ms. Shaw began working with Lee Breuer of Mabou Mines, during his production of Epidog, and has continued with Peter and Wendy, for which Mr. Breuer asked her to participate as co-puppetry director as well as Master Puppeteer of Hook and Jane, Ecco Porco for which she choreographed a final "Monkey King puppetry/dance extravaganza" using silk shirts, and Dollhouse. For Dollhouse, Ms Shaw built and directed a sequence involving 36 marionettes manipulated in tandem controls of 6. She also collaborated in an early workshop version of Red Beads for which she developed many striking images, including a dog puppet whose skin was ripped away by wind to reveal its skeletal body. Ms. Shaw works frequently with Theodora Skipitares on her many productions, from puppet construction to performance, including her recent production of The Traveling Players. Present The Women of Troy. She has worked with Stephen Kaplan building puppets for Julie Taymor's production of The Green Bird, and as a performer with Janie Geiser, Evidence of Floods.
Ms. Shaw is co-founder and co-curator of the VOICE 4 VISION PUPPET FESTIVAL, an annual festival devoted to presenting New York artists making work for puppetry. She has studied Bunraku sculpting and Kuruma Ningyo manipulation in Charleville-Mezierre with Designated Living National Treasure Nishikawa Koryu IV, at the Institut International de la Marionette, through a grant from the Institut and UNIMA USA. She recently graduated on the Deans list earning an MFA in Directing from Brooklyn College. While there she directed an experimental version of The House of Bernarda Alba which combined live actresses, graphic and giant shadow images as well as life-size puppets. She is scheduled to premiere a new work at La Mama E.T.C. in March of 2010.
SARAH PROVOST has been creating and performing in works for puppetry for over 15 years. Her original work includes The Adventures of Charcoal Boy performed at Here Arts Center (2006) and National Puppet Festival, St. Paul, MN (2007). The work was developed in the Mabou Mines Resident Artist Program, the Arts at St. Anns Puppet Lab (2003/2004), and at the MacDowell Colony. Project B, a collaborative group of three women artists (including Jane Stein and Nancy Salomon Miranda) produced three works, Eh Joe and Come and Go by Samuel Beckett and Still Sounds developed at the Arts at St. Anns Puppet Lab. All three works were presented at Theatre for the New City as part of the Voice 4 Vision Puppet Festival (2004).
Sarah created two original solo works, combining monologue, puppetry and object theatre. Antarctica Hangs Up performed at Todo Con Nada (1995), and A Pipe Dream, performed at the New York Fringe Festival (1996) and at the Painted Bride in Philadelphia.
Other notable credits include performances with Mabou Mines: the Obie-award-winning Peter And Wendy at the New Victory Theater and various tours, Epidog at Here, and Ecco Porco at PS 122. Numerous works with Theodora Skipitares include Optic Fever, A Harlots Progress, Body Of Crime, Under The Knife and Underground, at La Mama and various tours. Other performances include: The Hiroshima Maiden by Dan Hurlin, The Long Christmas Ride Home by Paula Vogel at the Vineyard Theatre, Maya The Bee at the Culture Project. Voice-over work includes: USA Networks Seeing Ear Theatre and WBAIs monthly radio play Automatic Vaudeville.
She has received grants from the New York State Council on the Arts and the Jim Henson Foundation and is a MacDowell Colony Fellow. She is co-founder and co-curator of the Voice 4 Vision Puppet Festival at Theater for the New City, now in its 5th year.
Sarah works as a Teaching Artist in the New York City Public Schools teaching puppetry, masks, and drama. She received a B.A. in Theatre from Temple University in Philadelphia (1991).
Jane Catherine Shaw
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