Date: Fri, 19 Dec 2008 13:24:29 -0800 (PST)
To: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
Subject: Re: [Puptcrit] Coconut and apples. & other organic materials for


Moss=A0makes beautiful puppet hair! I lived for about 6 years in Queen Charlotte Islands, Canada, in a rain forest climate and always had dried moss around and=A0buckets of shells, eagle and raven feathers, salmon gills, bear claws, agates and=A0drift wood. I carved the hands and the shoes=A0for my puppets=A0out of=A0Yellow Cedar, Red Cedar and Pine. 
Alan, thank you for=A0"gourd", a new English word=A0that enriched my=A0ESL vocabulary. What I meant by "squash" was in fact, "gourd" :O)
Carolina

--- On Fri, 12/19/08, Alan Cook <alangregorycook-AT-msn.com> wrote:

From: Alan Cook <alangregorycook-AT-msn.com>
Subject: [Puptcrit] Coconut and apples. & other organic materials for pppet making
To: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
Date: Friday, December 19, 2008, 11:03 AM

Potatoes have been used for short term puppets---make a neck hole with an apple
corer, stick on eyes with pins (a la Mr Potato Head)- use a cloth handkerchief
for the body  and tiny rubber bands over thumb and whatever finger you use to
represent the puppet's other "hand".

Current discussions have already touched on gourds, which can make good heads 
and small gourds can represent hands. I just packed up an elephant hand puppet
from Africa made from a gourd.---- the trunk is the gourd's neck, so you
have to select the right shapes. 

Steve Carter has made some neat puppets from branches. Basil Milovsorov
experimented with such materials.
Jeff Karsner has created puppets from plant material at the Gardens of the
Huntington LIbrary in San Marino, CA.

To my surprise I learned one can grow Spanish Moss in my area--there is a wad
of it growing on a tree in my yard---it is an air plant---makes great hair for
organic puppets. Seed pods come on many shapes---can be good for ears, eyes,
tongue, etc.

I have a pair of Rumanian cornhusk rod puppets which are basically dolls on
sticks, but can be effective in dance routines.

ALAN COOK


-----Original Message-----
From: Caro Stewart
Sent: Friday, December 19, 2008 1:16 AM
To: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
Subject: Re: [Puptcrit] Coconut and apples

Gorgeous dolls, Grego. The faces are expressive and funny, indeed.=EF=BF=BDNever
heard before of apple being used as doll material. You are also good at choosing
beautiful clothing for your dolls.
In Romania as children, we used to make dolls from dried Yellow Crookneck
squash, corn husks=EF=BF=BDand chestnuts. Not as sophisticated as yours, though...
For the babushka squash we only needed a bandanna. The teddy bears required more
attention and after picking the green capsule (each with a pair of chestnuts
inside) off the chestnut tree, we were rubbing the=EF=BF=BDcapsule against an
abrasive=EF=BF=BDrock. The freshly exposed furry looking surface was drying fast
and changing color from green to chocolate. Then we were connecting the parts
with toothpicks. 
Good luck at the Festival!
Carolina

--- On Thu, 12/18/08, grego-AT-neko.pair.com <grego-AT-neko.pair.com> wrote:

From: grego-AT-neko.pair.com <grego-AT-neko.pair.com>
Subject: [Puptcrit] Coconut and apples
To: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
Date: Thursday, December 18, 2008, 8:43 PM

Mathiew, this teaser is probably too late to use with your existing
coconut shells, but in Laos people sometimes cut and dry them to resemble
shriveled grotesque faces. The results are used in puppet performance. I'm
sorry I can't provide more details at present, but may be able to
elaborate in the future.

The idea of dried fruit as doll material will remind some people of the
American folk art of apple dolls. This is something that I started messing
with a few years ago, and am now introducing to asia. Hence a question
I've been meaning to ask here; does anybody know of these normally
decorative darlings being used as puppets? And if any of you are or know
people who are experienced and up on the minutia of finer apple doll
construction, I'd love to make contact.
You can see some of my results, including apple dolls in kimonos, at
http://www.gregoland.com/am/am.html
You won't be able to read the text there, but if you click around on the
links there are some fun pics.

Currently writing from Bangkok, (gulp) where, thankfully, a cooling of
political tensions has allowed us to go ahead with a performance festival
that starts today. I don't know how much of this food you've tried, or
how
authentic, but I might be needing an asbestos rectum.

-G

-G
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