From: Linda Elbow <breadpup-AT-together.net>
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 2009 21:55:51 -0500
To: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
Subject: Re: [Puptcrit] Architectural Puppetry


Thinking about the cost of these super giant puppets disgusts me.
Puppets are one thing. All that money - for what? - is another.
Way too indulgent.
Homeless people, starving people, etc., etc., etc.
Not to mention that a fraction of what it costs to mount and animate  
one of those things could pay for us all to make new shows and do  
free workshops for a much greater social payoff.
Sorry,
Linda



On Nov 23, 2009, at 9:31 PM, Stephen Kaplin wrote:

> So who needs an 80' elephant in Midtown New York? Right? Right!
>
> It's curious about how the NYC architecture dwarfs even the largest
> puppets. When I was involved in the grand mega-puppet spectacle that
> Michael Curry concocted for Times Square 2000, I was overwhelmed by it
> magnificent scale when in the middle of it. But when I watched it back
> on video, I was struck by how even his enormous creations (some well
> over 100' long) just evaporated into puniness in the cacophonous
> visual landscape of Times Square.
>
> Never-the-less, I wish something on the scale of Royal De Luxe could
> be arranged for the good citizens of Gotham.
>
> Anyone got a clue?
>
>   Stephen
>
>
> On Nov 23, 2009, at 7:08 PM, Simon Palmer wrote:
>
>> It's difficult to imagine Royal de Luxe in New York. The city that
>> has already absorbed so many giants and monsters from King Kong to an
>> animated Statue of Liberty via the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man...
>>
>> Simon Palmer
>> Illustrated History
>> +44 (0) 161 611 0739
>> +44 (0) 7944 804414
>> www.illustrated-history.net
>> www.doodleblog.co.uk
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On 23 Nov 2009, at 15:18, Stephen Kaplin wrote:
>>
>>> Dear all,
>>>  I find Simon's critique extremely interesting. I believe that
>>> puppetry in general, and mega-puppetry forms in particular are
>>> distillations of core sets of cultural values. Thus the giant  
>>> figures
>>> of industrial Europe reflected the social order of the day-- being
>>> assembled and operated by church groups, guilds, unions or political
>>> parties.
>>> Contemporary social order has rapidly shifted and so the nature of
>>> mega-puppetry in contemporary Europe has naturally shifted with it.
>>> Does Royal De Luxe-- with its swarms of lilliputian operators of  
>>> vast
>>> hydrolic  hoisting systems-- not give shape to the present social  
>>> and
>>> political structure?
>>>
>>> Architectural puppetry on the scale of Royal De Luxe does not seem
>>> possible in New York City. And that's not just because the street
>>> lights and overhead wires would impede the figures. There just does
>>> not seem to be the requisite cultural and support network in  
>>> place to
>>> make an event of that scale happen. I believe Lincoln Center was in
>>> negotiations with them-- but that it fell through due to the immense
>>> monetary costs.
>>>
>>> Well, I guess it's up to us lilliputians.
>>>
>>> Stephen
>>>
>>> On Nov 23, 2009, at 2:40 AM, Simon Palmer wrote:
>>>
>>>> Very interesting film. I was particularly impressed by the giant
>>>> Bayard carrying the Four Sons of Aymon...
>>>>
>>>> However, I still can't see more than a very generalized link  
>>>> between
>>>> these performances and those of Royal de Luxe. The Sultan's  
>>>> Elephant
>>>> is 15 to 20 feet taller than the horse in the Pathe newsreel, it's
>>>> no
>>>> longer at an heroic but at an architectural scale. This is a new  
>>>> but
>>>> rapidly expanding tradition of architectural marionettes: the Royal
>>>> de Luxe figures differ in scale, scope and ambition from Catalonian
>>>> gigantes, Meyboom giants, Brazilian carnival figures and so on.  
>>>> They
>>>> are not just 'big,' or 'larger than life,' they are monumental  
>>>> (they
>>>> even make architectural interventions - the giant bursting through
>>>> the roof of an apartment building in Le Havre or sitting on top of
>>>> Gaudi's Pedrera in Barcelona) and this already differentiates the
>>>> work from historical precedents; but it isn't the only  
>>>> difference...
>>>>
>>>> The second difference follows from the first and is again
>>>> quantitative.There is (must be) a huge administrative machine  
>>>> behind
>>>> the machine. I don't think it's too much to say that the Royal de
>>>> Luxe event in London a few years ago made a far bigger impact on
>>>> administrators than on puppeteers. This sort of work offers a huge
>>>> opportunity and challenge to the administrative class. This is
>>>> puppetry as itinerant architecture and, like architecture, you
>>>> cannot
>>>> get your idea or design into production unless you work with and
>>>> through various bureaucratic structures. Suddenly the "cutting-
>>>> edge,"
>>>> "imagination capturing" work in puppetry requires a budget of
>>>> hundreds of thousands, even millions of pounds (dollars, euros).
>>>> Discounting the special needs of cinema, puppetry is tied to  
>>>> capital
>>>> as never before. Before we are aware of any specific content a
>>>> performance of this type represents primarily a triumph of the  
>>>> will.
>>>>
>>>> "The history of architecture is not the chronology of architectural
>>>> form but the genealogy of architectural will," writes Jeffrey  
>>>> Kipnis
>>>> in "In the Manor of Nietzsche" (1990), and a similar genealogy, a
>>>> constantly renewed generational struggle with scale, the fight for
>>>> "very big" ideas, will certainly form a significant part of the
>>>> forthcoming landscape for puppetry (European puppetry at least).
>>>> Unfortunately the vast majority of this expansive and expensive new
>>>> work will not be made by Royal de Luxe. Demand far exceeds supply:
>>>> every British city and regional council now has some variant of the
>>>> Sultan's Elephant on its cultural wish list, but there's also  
>>>> demand
>>>> from advertising agencies, events management companies, concert
>>>> promoters and others (for instance, pop group Take That's recent
>>>> "Circus Tour" features a somewhat flimsy pastiche of the Sultan's
>>>> Elephant). There is obviously a risk in producing work of the
>>>> required size but losing the mystery and pathos of the original,  
>>>> of,
>>>> in other words, failing on an unprecedented scale. Are we going to
>>>> extend the limits of puppet performance or simply extend the
>>>> platform
>>>> on which we deliver mediocrity? I'm reminded of this chilling,
>>>> tragi-
>>>> comic excerpt from Arthur Drexler's Transformations in Architecture
>>>> (1979): "In 1960, some months before his seventy-fifth birthday,
>>>> when
>>>> Ludwig Mies van der Rohe was asked to describe his working day, he
>>>> answered: "I get up. I sit on the bed. I think, 'what the hell went
>>>> wrong? We showed them what to do.'"
>>>>
>>>> There is certainly hope, however, because the third difference
>>>> between traditional forms of giant puppetry and the new
>>>> possibilities
>>>> opened up by Royal de Luxe is qualitative. We are not just faced
>>>> with
>>>> the logistical and economic implications of the Elephant or the
>>>> Diver
>>>> and his Niece but there are also stylistic innovations. In his
>>>> "Mediators" essay (Negotiations, 1995) Gilles Deleuze makes a
>>>> distinction between quantitative and qualitative developments in,
>>>> among other things, sport: "Sports [...] have their quantitative
>>>> scale of records that depend on improvements in equipment, shoes,
>>>> vaulting poles... But there are also qualitative transformations,
>>>> ideas which are to do with style: how we went from the scissors  
>>>> jump
>>>> to the belly roll and the Fosbury flop." The differences between a
>>>> processional carnival figure and Big Bird are not incremental but
>>>> delivered via a stylistic leap, a transformation forced by new
>>>> demands, increased flexibility and an absolute engagement with the
>>>> puppet's mouth. The conception of Big Bird represents a Fosbury  
>>>> flop
>>>> moment in the history of puppetry (they were both popularized and
>>>> perfected within a year or two of each other).
>>>>
>>>> The Royal de Luxe puppets are not just bigger than most puppets,
>>>> their size also demands new forms of control - pulleys, hydraulic
>>>> lifts and multiple (as many as twenty) operators. These
>>>> "lilliputian"
>>>> operators swarm the figures, they create a vague turbulence into
>>>> which gestures rise and fall; they don't control the character,  
>>>> they
>>>> attend to it; they don't move the character, they let it to move.
>>>> They "busy themselves about the puppet, but without any affectation
>>>> of competence or discretion, or any advertising demagogy" (Roland
>>>> Barthes, "On Bunraku").
>>>>
>>>> Finally the narrative itself escapes from the usual totaliziing
>>>> frame
>>>> - instead of the transparent festival, we have discontinuity,
>>>> occlusions and fragments. These are seismic events that cannot be
>>>> understood at once. Things happen simultaneously in different parts
>>>> of the city, the whole cannot be grasped, it overflows and floods
>>>> our
>>>> capacity to perceive with *authority*. It is necessary to piece the
>>>> story together via a communal retelling, a sharing of segments.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Simon Palmer
>>>> Illustrated History
>>>> +44 (0) 161 611 0739
>>>> +44 (0) 7944 804414
>>>> www.illustrated-history.net
>>>> www.doodleblog.co.uk
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 22 Nov 2009, at 22:04, Bell, John wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Here is another Pathe video, showing rare (I think) footage of
>>>>> giant puppets in Brussels in 1935: http://www.britishpathe.com/
>>>>> record.php?id=6338.
>>>>> It's good to keep this in mind when thinking of the recent and
>>>>> amazing work of Royal De Luxe in Berlin...
>>>>> jb
>>>>> ________________________________________
>>>>> From: puptcrit-bounces-AT-puptcrit.org [puptcrit- 
>>>>> bounces-AT-puptcrit.org]
>>>>> On Behalf Of Robert Rogers [robertrogers-AT-robertrogerspuppets.com]
>>>>> Sent: Sunday, November 22, 2009 4:55 PM
>>>>> To: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
>>>>> Subject: [Puptcrit] Pathe videos
>>>>>
>>>>> Both are truly amazing!  Thanks guys!
>>>>>
>>>>> Robert Rogers
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> List address: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
>>>>> Admin interface: http://lists.puptcrit.org/mailman/listinfo/
>>>>> puptcrit
>>>>> Archives: http://www.driftline.org
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> List address: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
>>>>> Admin interface: http://lists.puptcrit.org/mailman/listinfo/
>>>>> puptcrit
>>>>> Archives: http://www.driftline.org
>>>>
>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>> List address: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
>>>> Admin interface: http://lists.puptcrit.org/mailman/listinfo/ 
>>>> puptcrit
>>>> Archives: http://www.driftline.org
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> List address: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
>>> Admin interface: http://lists.puptcrit.org/mailman/listinfo/puptcrit
>>> Archives: http://www.driftline.org
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> List address: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
>> Admin interface: http://lists.puptcrit.org/mailman/listinfo/puptcrit
>> Archives: http://www.driftline.org
>
> _______________________________________________
> List address: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
> Admin interface: http://lists.puptcrit.org/mailman/listinfo/puptcrit
> Archives: http://www.driftline.org

_______________________________________________
List address: puptcrit-AT-puptcrit.org
Admin interface: http://lists.puptcrit.org/mailman/listinfo/puptcrit
Archives: http://www.driftline.org