MASTERS AND PUPPETEERS : ANDSPRING PUPPET COMPANY, SANS LANGUE DE BOIS

The approach of the prestigious Handspring Puppet Company, founded in South Africa by Adrian Kholer and Basil Jones, is part of the subversive tradition of puppet theatre. From their first puppet show for adults, they denounced racism and homophobia. Then, alongside the visual artist and director William Kentridge, through a fruitful confrontation between puppetry and video art, they forcefully fought the apartheid regime. Later, sensitive to the defence of animals, they participated in the international adventure War Horse, manipulating life-size horses in an amazing way. Today, with Simply Peter, they campaign against the exploitation of shale gas by hydraulic fracturing. These different artistic and highly political actions allow us to question the impact of the puppet, a powerful revelator of what is allowed to be said or not in the public space.