nature boy puppet head sculpture

Nature Boy will be a bunraku puppet, which is a traditional Japanese form of puppetry employing three puppeteers on one puppet. The effect is fine articulation of a puppet's movements. I am attracted to bunraku for that reason and because I love to watch the relationship between puppet and puppeteer. The actual hands-on handling and group coordination of the puppet is beautiful to me. I love watching the relationship of the puppet to the puppeteers appear and disappear as you watch the movement.

I start the process of making the bunraku by sculpting the head out of clay. Then I papier mache brown paper and newspaper over the sculpture. After the papier mache has dried, I cut that off and put it back together, which is the puppet's head. Here is the sculpture before I papier mache, and was trying out materials for the hair also. The body is being made by one of my favorite visual and textile artists in Minneapolis, Amber Jensen. She will be collaborating on designing some of the textiles/puppet costumes in the show and making them also. In the interim, the adult puppeteers have been rehearsing and exploring movement with a similar bunraku puppet from a previous show.