A year ago, puppeteers Shoshana Bass and Sarah Nolen with the Sandglass Theater in Vermont came to Homer to provide an artist talk and a work in progress version of “Feral,” a puppet play. During their visit last fall, they conducted interviews with Homer residents and at the time, Bass provided comments to the Homer News explaining that their goal was to explore the relationship between domestication and wilderness and how this transition is articulated in female bodies.
Bass is a second generation puppeteer, her parents are the founders of Sandglass Theater. Her father is originally from New York City and her mother is from Germany. The family Vermont non-profit performance venue opened in 1996 in a theater constructed from a renovated barn, a feature that Bass says contributes to her appeal of Pier One Theatre as an original shop and work space.
The Sandglass Theater website describes their vision and value as a space that bridges local, national and international communities for artistic and social development. The organization values “the ensemble process, the artistic exchange of ideas, collaboration as a means of developing and sustaining our field, the responsibility of creating and teaching theater and a respect for the culture and tradition of our art forms.”
“Feral,” addresses the act of making visible the endeavor of women celebrating intuitive knowledge, how it is housed in our bodies, and how it can be used as a tool for individual and cultural repair. “A wolf-who-is-no-longer-a-wolf returns to the forest, within her the violation of domestication and a claim of ownership on her body.” She yearns for instincts of which she feels only traces. This is a story of disruption within a woman’s life when the wolf inside her howls, and the possibilities of reintegration with that feral voice.” The plot is described on both the Bunnell website and Sandglass Theater.
Here is how the project has expanded since Bass and Nolen were in Homer last year:
“So last time, Sarah and I just came to the two of us, and we did a lot of sharing of the process of what we were working on, we did a kind of installation, almost with small excerpts of what we've been working on, and all of that is leading up to this moment where we were able to come back with the entire team, which is Sarah myself, but also day Hernandez, who is part of the performance company, and Maria pugnetti, who's our amazing technician, slash also the person who does the live music for the show. And it's really exciting to be back with the full thing.”
Also accompanying Bass and Nolen for the upcoming event are Dey Hernandez and Maria Pugnetti.
Bass provided some comments on the opportunity to perform at the Pier One Theater:
“…this theater is so embedded in the space of Alaska, like it's in an active shipyard surrounded by these boats. It's a community space. It's old and quirky, and puppeteers love that kind of but it gives us, if we feel rooted in a certain community, by being in here, I think that's, yeah, yeah, that's what really drew us into this fun space.”
Homer will be the only venue location in the state where “Feral” is performed and Bass explained the importance of bringing the show back to a place where interviews and stories were collected. Bass noted that the “bedrock” of the project includes personal international testimony from women in many countries. The original and fundamental inspiration for the project came from Paulina Mendez, a woman with Mexican heritage now based in Germany, she wrote a thesis on erasures of systems of knowledge, specifically in women and indigenous culture,” Bass explained. Bass concluded by noting the significance of bringing the program back to the location where information was originally collected:
“...every time we go to a new place, or most times, and we tour in many different ways, but the beauty of touring to a place like Homer through Bunnell, that the relational aspect of touring is really celebrated and important. So we had the opportunity to do these interviews here in the community and play it back for the community.”
Sarah Nolen holds a Master’s Degree in puppetry Arts from the University of Connecticut and explained her history and interest in the genre noting that it started in elementary school when she was asked to provide presentations such as a book report she wanted to use a puppet as a back-up or secondary voice in addition to her own. She also described a puppet as a prop or a medium between herself and the “audience,” in youth years referring to other student listeners.
The performers recommend an audience age of 14, but younger audience members may attend with their parents’ discretion.
Shows will be held on Friday, Saturday and Sunday at Pier One Theatre on the Spit at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $20 for adults and $10 for youth and can be purchased online through the Pier One website. In addition to the evening shows, the puppeteers will be providing a free community discussion event at Bunnell at 1 p.m. on Sunday.
