Pictures from the Pablo Cano Marionette and Art Show
Today we attended a beautiful marionette show at the Museum of Contemporary Art in North Miami, FL. It featured a Greek-myth inspired play populated by stunningly detailed and charming marionette puppets made from found objects (aka trash!) by the incredibly talented Miami-based artist, Pablo Cano. You can see many of his beautiful and very moving pieces and find out more about this unique artist on his web site.
The show, an original libretto by the artist's friend, told a tale of Cavaletti, a Renaissance knight who longs to make a name for himself, but falls asleep in the forest and dreams of interacting with Odysseus and many members of the Greek pantheon, including Athena, Aphrodite, the Chimera (made from a lady's purse, a headboard and some LED lights, it's the red creature puppet seen in the pictures), the Cyclops, the Pegasus and much more.
The stage was hand-crafted for the show, and had empty doorways on either side of the backdrop as stage wings, instead of the traditional perpendicular theater entrances. The actors stepped right on and off the stage in front of us. In this way, the stage mimicked the mechanics of a German cuckoo clock! The show was absolutely fantastic, and afterwards the artist, Mr. Cano, directly interacted with the children and was happy to answer all their questions. Much to my surprise, he didn't chastise the children who got so curious and fascinated with his pieces that they couldn't resist reaching out and touching. He even let our friend Simon work the wings on the Pegasus! He was very kind, and is obviously very, very talented. What a great experience for everyone! Below are the pictures.

