The Memory Project: Storytelling through visual arts, theater & puppetry

  NEWTOWN ITALIAN SENIOR CITIZEN CENTER SHADOW PUPPET STORYTELLING WORKSHOP Friday June 2, 2023 Today is our final class before the Public Celebration on June 9. It has been a privilege and an honor to be working again with my colleague Spica Wobbe and the amazing students of the Shadow Puppet Storytelling Workshop at Newtown Italian Senior Citizen Center. We want to express our sincerest gratitude to the Director, Maria Cuoco and her assistant, Heidi Schmidt as well as the rest of the staff. They have enthusiastically supported our program and offered us assistance whenever it’s been requested.   Spica met early with Paul and Rita Tang to go over their shadow puppet performance. Once in the classroom, Paul performed his story twice for recording purposes. As Paul cannot attend the Public Celebration next week, we will play a video of this performance. Other students marveled at Paul’s deft manipulation of his puppets as well as his clear storytelling. Paul told the story of his experi

  SELFHELP LATIMER GARDENS OLDER ADULT CENTER SHADOW PUPPET STORYTELLING WORKSHOP Friday June 2, 2023 We are so fortunate to have an enthusiastic and dedicated group of students at the Selfhelp Latimer Older Adult Center. They arrive early to rehearse their shadow puppet performance and take every opportunity to develop and hone their skills. I am thrilled to be working with my amazing colleague Spica Wobbe again and honored to have this chance to meet and work with more talented older adults. Both Spica and I want to express our sincerest gratitude to Helen Yang the Director and her staff who have always made us feel so welcome and cheered on the participants so enthusiastically. These students love a challenge and rise to the occasion, experimenting with different forms and creating some incredible special effects.   CK (Chuan Kui) arrived early so she could set up her shadow puppets and make sure everything was in its rightful place. Her shadow puppetry performance documents the uni

  NEWTOWN ITALIAN SENIOR CITIZEN CENTER SHADOW PUPPET STORYTELLING WORKSHOP Friday May 26, 2023 Our class continues to attract more students and today was no exception, with a new member who decided to watch while participants rehearsed their shadow puppet story and offered insightful advice and asked interesting questions, which helped focus the story telling.  Spica met with Rita before class to go over with her the order of presentation of her puppets. This is an example of the dedication and enthusiasm of our participants. She decided to add color to the top of each pot of food, to help distinguish the rice from the vegetables, and the chicken from the pork. Her husband, Paul, has made all his shadow puppets and has a very clear idea of the order of presentation as well as the sound effects needed to enhance his story.  Once all rehearsals were complete, students had the opportunity to finish the final touches to their puppets or make the ones that were missing and necessary to hel

  SELFHELP LATIMER GARDENS OLDER ADULT CENTER SHADOW PUPPET STORYTELLING WORKSHOP Friday May 26, 2023 It was a pleasure to meet our other class members, Susana, Chun Qin, and Jia Ling, who were traveling last week. They quickly and enthusiastically began working on their shadow puppet storytelling, taking up where they left off.  Chun Qin and Jia Ling played with ideas for their title card, American Dream . They are telling the story of how they came to New York to give their daughter the opportunity to study ballet here when she was in her early teens. Jia Ling cut out an amazing representation of the New York skyline. All participants made the frame for their shadow theater adding decorative strips of paper to cover the cardboard frame on the front, white paper carefully taped on the back for the light to shine through and black strips of paper to complete the frame on the back. Spica had cut out small “feet”, which were slotted into place to hold the frame. Everyone enjoyed practici

  QUEENS PUBLIC LIBRARY "Creative Aging: Virtual Family Album Pop-Up Bookmaking" Tuesday May 23, 2023 Our class today focused on making the portrait page, which signifies the author of the pop-up book., or to whom the book is dedicated. In Beth’s case she is making a pop-up book for her grandson, so she brought in a school photo of him. We warmed up by thinking of a word that described us and presenting a facial and body gesture which suggested this word. Sonia’s word was “shy”, depicted by fiddling with her hands and looking down from the camera, Beth used large hand gestures to show her creativity while a new class member, Marilyn, smiled broadly depicting her happy disposition.    Spica and I shared our portrait pop-up pages and explained our choices of background shapes and colors to symbolize our chosen personality word. I also demonstrated the pocket and how the word is placed in it and can be pulled out to help describe the page when sharing your book.    Spica reviewe

  SELFHELP LATIMER GARDENS OAC SHADOW PUPPET STORYTELLING WORKSHOP Friday May 19, 2023 It is a privilege to work with Spica again delivering The Memory Project, Storytelling through shadow puppetry workshop at Selfhelp Latimer Gardens Older Adult Center in Flushing. Our two students who attended today’s class are self motivated and very creative. It was a great pleasure to work with Chuan Kui (CK) again after she attended one of our last classes before COVID. As always, she loves the engineering aspect of creating and is always curious and inventive.    CK finished her Chinese lantern and experimented with adding color, which upon investigation she realized would not look so good. She added Chinese writing into the center of the lantern. Her dragon came alive when she added a control to the center. She also finished the puppet of two brothers carrying a basket by adding 2 controls and practicing behind the shadow screen.    Qiu Ping Guo intricately cut spokes into a large wheel which s