With Ishara Theatre Festival beginning on Friday, Delhi is all set to experiment with colourful puppets to resonate with the colourful play of spring.

The festival produced by Teamwork Productions, focuses on new contemporary work from India and abroad, and is seen as an established platform to further multimedia arts in the country. The shows range from traditional rod and visual stories and epics presented using experimental techniques. This year the festival aims to spread the magic of puppetry with groups and artistes from the US, Germany, Iran, Taiwan, Afghanistan, Israel, Australia, Italy, Bulgaria, Ireland and India. A few shows will also travel to Epicentre, Gurgaon and NCPA, Mumbai.
Veteran puppeteer Dadi Pudumjee, the founder of the festival says, “Innovation is the common thread in all the shows.” The festival opens with A Life in Her Day at India Habitat Centre on Friday. The rib-tickling one-woman show by Hillary Chaplain has been directed by Avner Eisenberg. Chaplin creates magic by clowning around and transforming ordinary items like a lamp post and paper towels into human objects. She enacts a quirky single woman, who meets a man, falls in love, gets married, goes on a Hawaiian honeymoon and has a baby — all in a day.
Chaplain has been recognised as one of America’s foremost professional physical comediennes. Director Eisenberg is a famous vaudeville performer, clown, mime, juggler, and sleight of hand magician.
Germany’s Sanjay and His Master, directed by Pudumjee and performed by Matthias Kuchta, will take the stage on February 4. This Indo-German puppet-music-theatre-project brings Western and India artistes together. Sanjay, a young man, leaves home and becomes a musician in Varanasi under the famous court-musician Ananda. He falls in love with his teacher’s daughter Nandita, and then the King decides he needs only one musician in his court. So Sanjay and his master have to compete in a concert and only one can stay in the court. Adapted from an old Buddhist tale from the Dshatakam, the play is about finding one’s place in the world and discovering their true calling.
Iran’s Yas-e-Tamam Theater Group unfolds seven stories of life, faith, freedom, miracles, and biblical characters in The Earth and the Universe on Sunday. Director Zahra Khyali Sabri re-narrates Masnavi, Sufi poet Rumi’s much loved book, to impart a divine and important message to the enchanted audience.
On February 6, The Backyard Story, performed by Taiwan’s Puppet Beings Theatre, showcases the universal tale; what do inanimate things do when they’re not being used? There are two housewives, who are neighbours, constantly quarrelling with each other. In their backyards, there are toys and clothes lying about, when a big red balloon comes by and touches each of them. Everything comes alive and each has its own interesting story to tell. Director Jack Sun’s work has been acclaimed in Taiwan and across the world.
Afghanistan’s Parwaz will narrate a folk tale, Bozak-e-Chini, on February 7. Parwaz is the first independent puppet theatre ensemble in Afghanistan. Buzak-e-Chini, a goat, and her three kids live in a jungle. One day she has to leave her kids alone and before leaving she warns them of the dangers of opening the door for strangers. Despite her warnings, a greedy wolf that joins forces with a cunning fox, jackal and raven, manages to trick the three little kids and capture them for dinner. The brave mother goat takes on the villains, before the Lion King delivers a wise verdict.
One of Israel’s famous performers, Yael Rasooly creates a visual language using different forms of theatre, music and contemporary puppetry in Paper Cut on February 7. This one-woman performance is a visual spectacle of object and paper theatre which brings the classic black and white cinema of Hollywood back to life.
Sydney Puppet Theatre, Australia, promises two fun-packed shows for kids and folks of all ages with Oh Rats! and A Package for Granny on February 9. Oh Rats! shows a magician and his new assistant, and their higgledy-piggledy with cheeky rats, a sausage circus, an escapologist duck and a special magic hat which multiplies objects. In A Package for Granny, well-known nursery rhymes and tales come to life as the audience joins the Granny and her friends Green, Yellow and the little Turtle on a voyage to find her lost package.
Pudumjee will be back on stage on February 10 to rediscover age-old tales of Indian mythology with his creation based on Adivasi folk tales, Genesis. This combination of shadow puppet, images and actors adapts the indigenous art forms of various tribal groups.
In Chick With a Trick, Bulgaria will showcase fairytales of Margarit Minkov on February 11. Director Peter Todorov and performer Desislava Mincheva tell a story about a hen who lays a bonbon instead of an egg and tries to sort out this problem. In the end, inspired by a sunny day and the children around, she convinces herself that there is nothing wrong in doing something unusual and different if it brings joy to others.
The audience will meet mysterious Stachamoose brothers from the mist-shrouded Orient in Ireland’s The Circus Stachamoose on February 12. Vlado is the enigmatic magician, while Elmer, in the words of Bob Dylan, is a song-and-dance man. Director and performer Tommy Baker will showcase a fantastic circus show that renders storytelling with humour, fantasy and realism.
Italy’s ambidextrous puppeteer Laura Kibel transforms her hands, feet, knees stomach and other parts into props during Gone With The Feet on February 13.