“A marionette is a word that moves.” – P.CLAUDEL

This course involves discovering the world of marionettes – a poetic and playful universe that stretches far beyond the bygone era of castles and barnstorms. If you remain unconvinced of their relevance in the modern world, you need only observe the increasing number of therapists that rely on puppets in their sessions… Sometimes, people don’t actually realise what a marionette workshop involves. In fact, it encompasses a diverse palette of competencies that are needed to be put into effect.

• Of course, the first thing we need to do is create our marionettes (using cardboard, paper and tissues) and these will be either hand puppets or string-controlled puppets, either little or big…
• Next is the language stage and time to come up with a story. Which story do the children want to tell? Their story? Do they want to adapt tales that they’d like to introduce to their parents? Either way, this stage offers children the chance to play with words and different languages.
• Third step: We have our characters and our story, now we need to create the setting: minimalist or realistic, as well as any accompanying visual or sound effects.
• Fourth and final stage : we always like our shows to be accompanied by live music. Therefore we need some people with musical knowledge and look for musicians amongst us to write and play music together for our show.

And voilà, as you can see, over the weeks the children have created their marionettes and learned the rudiments of how to manipulate their puppets. Now, it’s finally time to play and bring our characters to life by creating a show that we will perform in front of the whole school.

When Eduardo di Mauro, Barbara Canese’s teacher and mentor, is welcomed by schools, he always repeats the same phrase: “the imaginary is the gateway to intelligence, it is our duty to feed and enrich a child’s imagination”.

For children aged: 5 to 9
Time: Friday from 15:40 to 16:30 (excluding school holidays)
Place: The fine arts room in the Voltaire school

Price:
-Trial lesson: free
-One-off payment: 22€ per month. In January there are only two sessions (18.1.13 and 25.1.13 no lessons), therefore 11€ for the month. In total, for the six months, this works out at: 11 + (22 x 5) = 121€
-Monthly payment: 25€ per month. In January there are only two sessions (18.1.13 and 25.1.13 no lessons), therefore 11€ for the month. In total, for the six months, this works out at: 11 + (25 x 5) = 136€
-N.B. – If you sign up your child to take part in a second or third course, the reduced fee of 22€ per child/month applies for the second and third course. If you sign up two children to take part in a course, the reduced fee of 22€ per child/month applies for the second child.
-Price excludes room rental costs and necessary materials (minimum number of participants : 8 pupils).

Course leader: Barbara Canese is a French national, a graduate of European studies, a puppeteer and a pedagogue. She learned the art of puppeteering under Éduardo Di Mauro of the Tempo theatre (Guanare, Venezuela). She founded the BÔ theatre in 2004, whose mission is the creation of a repertoire of puppets and comedians, as well as the translation and circulation of foreign repertoires. She has organised marionette workshops for children and adults in Berlin and France since 2004 and has collaborated with the annual “Eclats de lire” festival from 2010 to 2012.