Breath and puppet (and fingers and sounds)

Here are some reflections on key areas of our last weekend's training session with Caroline in London.

Leading the puppet by its head:

Caroline had us operate a plain piece of cloth (increasing its complexity and range of motion by adding rods by and by) and it became obvious that the quickest transition from an inanimate object to an alive puppet was by giving it a head: a center of intelligence and perception, from which one could lead the puppet into meaningful movement and interaction.


Some thoughts on breathing:










From the spectator's point of view: if I'd see an animal or human body lying on the ground I instinctively would scan it for signs of breath to determine if it is alive. And I would be able to detect even the slightest ripple of breath movement within the body from quite a distance to it.

From the puppeteer's point of view:
To send your energy to and through the puppet is one of the fundamental lessons that Caroline keeps reminding us. Using the sensation and rhythm of breathing can enhance this directed flow of attention to an astonishing degree: the puppet can be felt to be organic extension of oneself, no matter whether the contact is by direct touch or transmitted through rods or strings.
In my case this takes time to develop and a lot of reminding myself of the importance of it when operating.

Things that can help me:
- The basic Chi Gong exercise of sensing my center (the area inside the belly just below the navel) and feeling the in-breath travel to there simultaneously through arms and legs and then in reverse flowing from there and out through my limbs on the out-breath.

- Energizing the hands through breathing by very slightly contracting and/or lifting the hand towards the center of the palm on the in-breath and releasing and/or very slightly spreading the hand away from the center of the palm on the out-breath.

- Using pauses to re-establish the breath-connection with the puppet: Caroline frequently reminds us that we tend to undervalue the power of the pause and quiet posture of the puppet and it seems that these pauses are the ideal opportunity to breath into the puppet rather than just freeze into a pose. Ironically, I noticed that I tend to hold my breath exactly during these opportunities.

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Finger exercises

This guy used to make a living by showing off with this set of finger exercises that he developed:




This is the first of a series of practice videos by Greg Irwin found on youtube.

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Resource for sound effects:

Here is a large collection of sounds that might be useful for puppet shows:

http://www.freesound.org/

Klaus