The Net vir Pret Barrydale Puppet Parade and Performance: 18 December 2022
Rehearsals are full steam ahead in Barrydale for the 2022 Puppet Performance and Parade created and produced by members of the CHR and aesthetic education partner, Net vir Pret.
This year’s parade is on Sunday 18th December and is entitled ‘The Life and Times of Duke, The Zebra’. It was devised since 2010 by Net vir Pret staff and interns, director Sudonia Kouter, puppet and set designer Herman Witbooi, and children’s puppet designer Clarissa Jones. This is an annual event organized in Barrydale, by the local community, and after a two-year absence, Net Vir Pret is excited to resume its live format and to welcome audiences to the parade and performance in Barrydale. ‘The Life and Times of Duke, The Zebra’ will be presented in the amphitheatre of the BF Oosthuizen Primary School. We look forward to seeing you there!
The CHR has engaged in this highly impactful and significant arts and aesthetic education project over the course of seven years, alongside Net vir Pret, and originally with the Handspring Trust for Puppet Arts. Since its inception this project has seen some seventy-five young artists going into higher education. We are therefore delighted to congratulate Peter Takelo and Derek Joubert of Net vir Pret on receiving their University of the Western Cape Gold Medal Awards for lifetime achievement at a moving awards ceremony in Cape Town.
LoKO workshop: ‘Puppetry, Pedagogies, Politics and Praxis’.
In October this year, Net vir Pret’s Giant Puppet designers Herman Witbooi and Clarisa Jonas accompanied puppeteering coach Angelo Endley and this year’s show director Sudonia Kouter to attend the ‘Puppetry, Pedagogies, Politics and Praxis’ workshop hosted by the CHR. Convened by CHR’s LoKO convenor Dr Aja Marneweck, the workshop hosted the renowned Handspring Puppet Company, the Ukwanda Puppetry Collective, local artist Jill Joubert, and representatives from universities in Argentina, Canada, India, Kenya, Mauritius and the USA. The Net vir Pret team made a presentation describing the decade-long puppetry work in Barrydale and especially the new techniques we are now employing in puppet design and construction. The event has strengthened even further the already firm partnership with the CHR.
What a Wonderful World
In 2020 and 2021, Covid affected many of the parade activities and Net Vir Pret had to make urgent changes to the format of the end-of-the-year show. This led to the production of ‘Reboot Eden’, a series of short puppetry-lead films created in collaboration with the Centre for Humanities Research and artists in residence Ukwanda Puppet and Design Arts Collective, commemorating the 10 years of puppetry. The project was nominated for the NIHSS awards this year. Then in 2021 Net Vir Pret developed and short a full-length feature movie entitled ‘What a Wonderful World’ which can be found on Net Vir Pret Youtube page.
