For Puppetry,
Collaborative Arts
& Creative Health
Provisions
Mobile site update in progress - please view on PC for a better experience
Founders of
Page Quick links
Our Work
Our work is structured around a creative development plan we call 'The 5 Elements'. Each element can be thought of as a root beneath our company's tree; with each branch representing the activities we facilitate with different audiences; creating provisions that address their self-identified needs. You can read more about these in the section below, or have a look around our portfolio of creative projects and workshops, by using the quick links menu on the left.
Our work is all structured around a creative development plan we call 'The 5 Elements'.
Each element can be thought of as one root beneath our company's tree; each nourishing a different branch of activity, focusing on different audiences and creating provisions that address their self-identified needs.
​
The 5 Elements and their related programming aims are:
​
FOUNDATIONS -
For Disabled Led, continually adaptive Organisational Development
​
INCLUSION -
Our programme for Emerging & Professional Artists with Disabilities
​
TRANSFORM -
Our Accessibility Consultancy , Training and Creative Sector Development activities
​
KINETICS -
Our Research and Artistic Development work exploring adaptive performance technologies
​
COMMUNITY -
Puppetry & Workshops For Intergenerational communities, Children and Families & those living with chronic illness
Our 5 Elements - or 'roots' - are bound together by a wide variety of artistic activities that provide constant inspiration, and our CREATIVE programme is generally the result of us merging several elements of this work together in dynamic blends to produce our original work - deliberately dissolving boundaries between the professional team, community groups and audiences. We like to think of these activities as being 'our tree's branches.'
CREATIVE -
See what's coming up on our creative programme and how you can get involved
To request a copy of our full list of previous projects, or to book an exclusive 5 Elements seminar for your company or community, please contact bekkie@brokenpuppet.co
Past Projects
(Just a few highlights!)
'EPHELANT!'
(Walkabout puppetry)
DILLY @ M.E
AWARENESS DAY
'DODO' (PROTOTYPE)
'THE BONE CRACKER'
DWP 'INCLUSION AT WORK' CONFERENCE
PUPPET MAKING
WORKSHOPS
'CAN YOU SEE ME NOW?'
EMERGING ARTISTS
SESSIONS
BROKEN LIVE: IN LOCKDOWN WITH INDIGO MOON
'KINETICS ONLINE R & D'
DERRIFORD HOSPITAL
CFD AWARENESS DAY
5 REALMS SET DESIGN &
ILLUSTRATION
CHARACTER DESIGN &
COSTUMING
INCLUSIVE PUPPETRY
ROAD TRIPS
SOCK PUPPET
PARTY @
QUAYSIDE LEISURE
CENTRE
New/Upcoming Work
For at least the next 3 years, ALL of our work will be focused within our CREATIVE/CHAOS REALM - Where all 5 Elements of our companies practice and core beliefs blend together to create highly functional but artistically brilliant puppetry performances and productions, each with their very own creative learning programme attached.
Historically, we have only taken on one or two of these larger scale, more ambitious projects at any one time, but after extensive time to develop our organisational plan and explore new artistic skills and ambitions throughout 2020-22 and the covid pandemic, our team, board members and participants all felt like it was time to focus our energies where we have always had the most impact - and fun!
Our work will always seek to promote inclusion and nurture diverse talent, and we'll still be doing all the work we were doing before, just in a more cohesive, collaborative way - and putting our combined artistic approaches at the centre of all our work, where they belong. We're even changing our name to reflect the brilliant diversity of creativity we offer both in and beyond theatre, and will become 'Broken Puppet Collaborative Arts' in the not too distant future!
​
This season, we are taking inspiration from our extensive 12-year strong portfolio of previous work, and nurturing the most ambitious parts of every successful project we've ever created! We're taking everything we've learnt from across all 5 Elements of our work to date, and essentially, putting it in a massive, messy, beautiful creative production blender! As a result, we are devising not one, not two, but THREE brand new highly significant, industry leading creative programmes that encapsulate 'all the best bits'; bringing into being our dream collection of interactive puppetry programmes - in a way we've never dared to deliver them before!
+
+
+
+
=
Our 3 Flagship CHAOS Programmes will be launched between April 2024 and April 2026, and will run for as long as our funding allows, which is most likely to be 2 years, depending on guidelines specified by the grant awarding bodies. We will confirm details once all funding streams have been secured.
Our current work is preparing funding applications for these 3 truly adventurous projects:
1. BROKEN LIVE: 'Cabinet of Curiosities' (An Integrated multimedia puppetry production)
& 'The CHRONIC 5 ELEMENTS' (Accompanying Workshops/Creative Learning programme)
[For over 16's, adults / HE/FE/ Professional & Medical Settings) -
This workshop is already available to book after launching a successful pilot in October 2023, but the show is still in development!
2. 'CREATURES OF CHAOS' (Live Puppetry Performances)
& 'The Quest of The 5 Realms' (Accompanying Workshops/Creative Learning programme)
[For 5 to 12's, specifically children & families living with chronic illness & their support networks]
As of January 2024, This programme entered a pilot R&D phase, self-funded by our core team, and we look forward to sharing developments soon!
3. 'TIPA - The Inclusive Puppetry Alliance' (An initiative to support the puppetry sector around inclusion)
& 'The Canopy Touring Theatre' (A Longer term project to create a fully inclusive touring festival venue, based around a converted touring trailer with its own pop-up creative spaces.
TIPA Launched successfully in collaboration with Puppet Place and their Bristol 48hr puppet film challenge in February 2023 - You can check out our short film 'A Splash of Mischief!' that screened at the live finale on our Youtube channel here! > https://youtu.be/5I_x3ucpCfs?si=UNLfuysdBprXHebD
Please check out the information below if you're interested in collaborating on any of these productions - we love to work with professional and community organisations who share our creative ambitions and social vision!
Partnerships & Artistic Collaborations
We enjoy connecting, collaborating, networking and partnering with individual artists & makers, creative practitioners/facilitators, other theatre companies, producers, venues, businesses, social enterprises, schools/out of school clubs, hospitals/hospices, social groups and community providers...
Anyone who shares our vision for a more inclusive society and in using puppetry, theatre arts, creative writing or film work to create positive change or beautiful artwork, or both, really!
​
We also support emerging artists and students throughout most of our creative and community programming, and within our funded projects.
​
If you're interested in collaborating or forming a project partnership with us, please contact our Creative Director/Producer, Clare McCarthy by emailing: clare@brokenpuppet.co or by phone on 07904 911555. Other forms of communication, such a zoom or messenger video call are also possible, please check the 'contact us' page for alternative access information.
SOME OF OUR PREVIOUS PARTNERS, TRAINING PROVIDERS & COLLABORATORS
.jpg)
.jpeg)
PETER MORTON OF
Future Plans & Collaborations
Plans are already in the pipeline for some very exciting new partnerships and collaborations with our great friends Peter Court from Creative Madness in South Africa, Andy Copps of Chalking Stories in London, as well as an expedition into secondary teaching with Lucy Bellingham of We Teach Drama in Lemmington Spa.
​
We'll also be talking to a host of individual artists and puppetry companies from our own region, so that members of our 'South West Puppetry Connection' zoom group can get in on some of the fun and chaos we've got in the pipeline, and exploring brand new collaboration opportunities with the wonderful Puppet Soup in South Wales, the create puppetry festival, the National Capitol Puppetry Guild and The British Puppet and Model Theatre Guild in the UK.
We hope to also be able to fund some incredible new wooden carved puppetry commissions featuring fellow students from Bernd Ogrodnik's World Class 'Academy of the Wooden Puppet' with International Puppetry Artists too! (funding dependent)
To explore our Creative Programming, click the Rune Stones and sneak behind the scenes to discover what's happening in each of our fantasy realms!
Visit the friendly
Realm of
Kin
Visit the Healing
Realm of
Earth
Visit the inventive Realm of
Water
Visit the adventurous Realm of
Air
Visit the Dynamic Realm of
Fire
