Installation: Potential Energy: Chicago Puppets Up Close

December 21, 2024 – April 6, 2025
Chicago Cultural Center, Michigan Avenue Galleries, 1st Floor East
Curated by Grace Needlman + Will Bishop
Coordinated by Ashwaty Chennat
Co-Presented by Chicago International Puppet Theater Festival

Chicago is home to a rich and growing ecology of puppetry, bridging mediums and communities of makers. This sampling of puppets by local artists challenges expectations about puppetry and inspires the public to tell their own stories. Puppets are made to tell stories. By taking puppets off stage, we can focus on how artists design specific stories into each object. How do artists invent new ways to mechanize materials in motion, build cohesive worlds, and create characters that expand our ability to understand and empathize with ourselves and others?

This is an exhibition of potentialities. How can the possibility for a particular story be built into a puppet? What are new and unexpected ways to use familiar materials? What stories could you imagine telling with these puppets? What stories do you want to tell and how can you start telling them?

Participating Artists

KT Shivak
Jaerin Son
Alonso Galue
Wendy Madrigal
Jacqueline Wade
Myra Su
Christopher Knowlton
Jacky Kesley
Sion Silva
Emilie Wingate
Chio Cabrera-Coz
Tom Lee
Tracey Christmas

Kendall Buckingham
The Reverend Van Ferdinand and Eric Mercure
August Boyne
Caitlin McLeod
Jerrell Henderson
Chicago Children’s Theater
Chicago Puppet Studio
Red Line Service Institute (Ravi Arupa, Tracey Christmas, Steffen Garcia, Shay Jones, Marcela Okeke, Efren Paderes, Reverend Van Ferdinand)
Manual Cinema
Jabberwocky Marionettes
Wonder Wagon
Rough House Theater Co.

Programming Schedule
Saturday, April 5

11 a.m. – 1 p.m.
Puppets in Progress
Puppets-In-Progress (PIPs) is an informal gathering for testing out new puppet and object-based performances. Bring whatever you’re working on and get encouragement and feedback from other puppet-folks!

Are you new to puppetry and want a low-stakes way to test the waters? Are you an old hand with a new project? Are you a dancer, comics artist, performance poet, teacher, lifeguard, or engineer just curious about what puppetry looks like today? Everyone is welcome! Bring a project, no matter how rough, or just come for the conversation.

This edition of PIPs is facilitated by Sam Lewis and Kevin Michael Wesson and, as always, hosted by Rough House Puppet Arts!
Sunday, April 6

10:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
Intro to Puppetry for BIPOC Artists, and Puppet Lovers
Shadow Puppet Workshop by Leah Lara + PUPPETQUEERS
Learning Lab, 1st Floor West

Potential Energy: Closing Slam!
Join us for a closing celebration of the flourishing puppetry scene of Chicago and the exhibit “Potential Energy: Chicago Puppets Up Close” and meet the artists behind the objects!

“Slams” are short-form — often in-progress — performances that are a cornerstone of Chicago’s puppet scene. This Closing Slam has two unique sets of performances that offer a slice of the diverse, inventive and interdisciplinary approaches to puppetry that are happening in our city.

1-2 p.m.

Chris Knowlton
Tracey Christmas
Kevin Michael Wesson
Alonso Galue

3-4 p.m.

Reverend Punchfizz and the Congregation
Myra Su
Jacqueline Wade
Alonso Galue

Wednesday, March 26

5-6:30 p.m.
In conversation with Artists & Curator
Claudia Cassidy Theater, 2nd Floor North

Talk 5-6 p.m.
Q & A 6-6:30 p.m.

Panelists: Tamar Evangelestia-Dougherty, Marissa Fenley, Grace Needlman, Abby Palen, Sivan Spector and Myra Sn

Moderated by: Zhenesse Heinemann
Saturday, February 22 & March 22

11 a.m. – 3 p.m.
Drop-in Touch Tours
Michigan Avenue Galleries, 1st Floor East

Touch tours are an opportunity for visitors to experience artwork through a guided experience of touching the artwork. They are designed as an accessibility tool for blind and low-vision people, but these touch tours are open to anyone (all ages and abilities). In Potential Energy these tours will be led by the artists who made the puppets. Artists can answer questions about their work, offer demonstrations, and guide visitors through experiencing the work through touch.
Saturday, January 25

11 a.m. – 4 p.m.
Drop-in Touch Tours
Michigan Avenue Galleries, 1st Floor East

Noon and 2 p.m.
Chicago International Puppet Theater Festival
Free Neighborhood Tour performances
Hungry Garden by Poncili Creación
Studio Theater in Renaissance Court, 1st Floor North