HOBT in Community 2022-2024
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Image description: Artist Chelly Beaver is performing a story of "The Day the Crayons Quit" by Drew Daywalt at a Richfield Early Childhood Literacy Event.
2023-2024 was an exciting year! Our artists taught mask and puppet making workshops, participated in Literacy and STEM events and engaged students in the art of Puppetry in the Twin Cities area. Saint Paul Academy, Harambe Elementary, Jeremiah Program, HedFex Home School, Cosmos Montessori, East Lake Library, St. Anthony Park Library, Children Lutheran Service Society, Sheridan Elementary, R-STEM Elementary, FAIR School at Pilgrim Lane, Families Together Preschool and Ella Baker Elementary hosted our artists this year.
Image description: Artist Laurie Witzkowski is working with a student during a mask making residency at St. Paul Academy.
HOBT artists engaged with audiences at several community events hosted by Franconia Sculpture Garden, MIA, Luminary Loppet, and once again, partnered with MN Orchestra!
Image description: The moon puppet greeting audience at the Luminary Loppet.
2022-2023
Check out the video footage from HOBT's Art Shaping Change workshops from February 2023. Taught by Sofía Padilla and Davey Steinman of Paradox Teatro at the Avalon, participants explored shadow and sand puppetry.
Video Credit: Adriana Foreman, @Yanimadit
Image Description: A video by Adriana Foreman shows clips from the Art Shaping Change Workshop of people experimenting with shadow puppetry performance.
Artists Laurie Witzkowski and Anne Sawyer are working at St. Joan of Arc with families to create masks for their Easter and Palm Sunday services.
Image Description: A photo of cardboard masks arranged in a circle are splayed out on a table at St. Joan of Arc.
Students from Hibbing High School learned how to make hand puppets and move with a whole variety of puppets on a field trip to the Avalon. The workshop was led by Madeline Helling.
Image Description: A photo of a students group crowded together, each wearing small animal hand puppets they crafted in the Avalon Theater.
Artists Julie Boada, Gustavo Boada, and Laurie Witzkowski also teamed up with HOBT to teach a week- long mask making residency to all of the sixth graders at St. Paul Academy.
Students reflected on their identities to create masks using clay, paper mache, and colored paper to bring forward important parts of themselves.
Artists also taught students all about the importance of body language and the power of a pose to express emotion with a mask. We thank this incredible team of teaching artists, educators and engaged middle schoolers!
Image Description: The photo shows a crowd of students, piled together seated on the floor wearing a variety of their handmade colorful masks, looking up.
Image Description: a photo of six students wearing different handmade cardboard masks and striking poses.
Artist Dominique Herskind taught an after-school puppet-making class at Ella Baker Global Studies & Humanities magnet school.
Dominique worked with 1-3 graders on winter themed puppets.
December 2022, HOBT partnered with other amazing org who showed up for Border CrosSing's event, Las Posadas community sings. It was a beautiful event full of puppets, music, art and food.
Image Description: An audience at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church watch puppeteers guide large puppets of Maria riding the donkey and Jose at their side. Puppets by Sandy Spieler.
Image Description: A photo of a child and adult kneeling at a table draped in blue. Board member Tia sits behind the table in a mask. A colorful bird puppet is perched on the table, mouth open. Another red cardinal puppet sits at the back of the table.
Fall of 2022 HOBT artists and staff set up a table to craft cardboard masks at one free MIA family day event. Kids made masks with pom poms, feathers, markers, and more. Then, they marched through museum halls.
Image Description: a photo of a small child holding a colored pencil at an orange table with adult helping hands beside them. A blank blue mask sit in front of the child and misc. materials like pom poms, glue, and paper, are strewn about the table.
Image Description: Four students paper mache a dragon head together in Henry's theater.
Summer of 2022 HOBT worked with puppeteers Madeline Helling, Akiko Ostlund, and Gustavo Boada to add visual accompaniment to the piece 'The Moldau' by Smetana with the MN Orchestra! Other artists and volunteers lent their talents as well, rehearsing and performing.
Image Description: A video clip shows various puppeteers dressed as animals like fox and frog wearing suits, conducting the MN orchestra. Musicians in all black carry stringed instruments.
Image Description: A still of a clickable youtube video with the MN Orchestra, showing a green puppet troll head by Beth Peterson and blue goblin-like puppets with text that reads "In the Hall of the Mountain King."
Image description: Two children laughing while interacting with Turnip the Dog during a Richfield Early Childhood Literacy event.
Image description: Artist Felicia Cooper presents her "Below the Underneath" puppet show to a group of 2nd graders.
Arts Shaping Change workshops were a huge success this year, taking place both at Roosevelt High School and the Midtown Global Market. Artists Fletcher Wolfe, Ifrah Mansour, Felicia Cooper, Maggie Arbeiter, Jake Quat, Stayci Bell and Lu Calvo-Searle engaged the audiences in the building of large-scale puppets.
Image description: Artists Jake Quatt, Lu Calve-Searle, Fletcher Wolfe, Stayci Bell, Felicia Cooper and Ifrah Mansour pose with a large BEAST puppet (in progress)
HOBT collaborated with the Walker Art Center to be a part of their Free First Saturday. Puppeteers dressed as pollinators buzzed about the Minneapolis sculpture garden delighting guests. Star and moon puppets roamed the area. There was also a puppet show, How to Know a Whale, created and performed by Felicia Cooper.
Image Description: Two photos appear. The first is a photo of Felicia Cooper performing a puppet show with a blue submarine in the background in front of a crowd. The second photos shows HOBT puppeteers dressed as bees running towards the camera in the sculpture garden.