PuppetLab

PuppetLab is a bold program at Hobt that supports emerging puppet artists in their quest to push outwards at the limits of figure theater. Under the tutelage of Alison Heimstead, four mentor-mentee director teams have been building original puppet shows since September of 2012.
The development process for each piece includes critique and discussion between the PuppetLab artists, workshops with established puppeteers, and direction and guidance from accomplished Twin Cities artists.
These shows have… Show more grown from tiny sketches to full blown post-apocalyptic trashscapes, 15-person cartoon choruses, black light-illuminated eight-eyed rabbits and Jersey cow-painted dinosaurs.
It's been a journey, and we hope you will join us in March for the end result--a series of performances guaranteed to delight, amuse, and perhaps unsettle audiences of all (adult) ages.
MARCH 1-3
Lepus Nacht: A Night In The Warren by Benjamin Brockman
A glimpse into a postapocalyptic landscape, in which the Lepus play and investigate with unending curiosity and vitality and discover, that like us, they must remain reverent and obedient to a mysterious natural order.
CARTOOON by Steve Ackerman
A case study of the controversial 1940s animated program "Tummy da Talking Turtle Sucks on Piano Keys" and the causality of a co-dependent relationship between a reptile and a quickly descending anvil.
MARCH 8-10
I Have Filthy Habits by Eben Kowler
Two siblings and an explorer cross paths in a terrarium. Weather patterns and behavior trends emerge, as three performers follow their habits into unknown and unstable territories.
FIVE Rules For Walking by Rosie Jablonsky
Hildegard lives in a world made entirely out of trash. Everything she has is the detritus of generations before, and her slippery memories are now the complete history of the world.
No one turned away for lack of funds.

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