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McGroarty Arts Center is gearing up for its 7th Annual Celebrate Puppetry Festival. The first official Celebrate Puppetry Festival debuted on April 24, 2004, and it has continued and grown ever since. Supported by an Outdoor Parade and Festivals Grant from the Department of Cultural Affairs, City of Los Angeles, the Puppetry Festival is an incredibly fun and entertaining event for people of all ages.

The planning for this major event starts months in advance. First, event organizers line up and schedule the puppeteers and locate food, crafts and game vendors. This year McGroarty is expanding the number and types of booths at the event by adding more and varied food booths, engaging activities, and vendors selling unique, hand-made crafts.

Beginning in May 2010, a month before festival day, three weekly workshops will be held at McGroarty Arts Center to entice participants to make and perform with puppets. Families, youth and community members are invited to attend any or all of the free pre-festival Making Shadow Characters workshops. The hands-on workshops introduce children to this ancient tradition of storytelling using figures and animals which are brought to life in front of an illuminated backdrop to create the illusion of moving images. The workshops include instruction on how to create these truly unique puppets. All workshop participants will be encouraged to exhibit their work at the festival and be puppetry ambassadors by sharing their knowledge with friends and other festival-goers.

The workshops serve as appetizers for the full-blown, day-long event, enticing people to attend the actual Festival on June 5, 2010 where they will see a long list of professional artists perform, attend more workshops, eat and shop! This year’s line up of performers and vendors will include several puppetry and arts organizations. Past participants included the LA Guild of Puppetry, International Puppetry Museum, Pacific Southwest Region of Puppeteers of America, Orange County Guild of Puppetry, the Arroyo Arts Collective and Gumplestiltskin. The festival artists are veteran national and international performers such as Bob Baker’s Marionettes, Buddy Big Mountain’s “Native American Stories,” Greg William’s “Mr. Fabulous with his cast of Hundreds,” Icarus Puppet Company’s “The Crane Daughter” and Bali & Beyond traditional Balinese Wayang Kulit Shadow Play and contemporary shadows such as “Alice in the Shadows.” Stay tuned to www.balibeyond.com/cp.html for performer updates and to join the email list.

A new twist on this year’s event is that McGroarty Arts Center is expanding its participation and leadership over the program. In past years the Center hosted the day, but this year McGroarty is the presenting organization. This means that McGroarty’s Executive Director, Program Staff, Board of Directors and instructors will all take an active role in promoting, attending and running this special event. Friends of McGroarty Arts Center (FOMAC) and Artist/Performer/Producer Maria Bodmann, Fulbright Scholar in Gamelan Music and Shadow Theater in Bali, Indonesia, will work together as a highly motivated team to coordinate event planning, scheduling, volunteers, outreach, recruiting participants, grass roots marketing efforts, and festival day logistics.

At the Festival everyone will have the opportunity to learn how to operate various styles of puppets, try their hands at making a butterfly puppet, learn more about Los Angeles puppeteers, events and puppet clubs, help your child create a masterpiece at the arts and crafts table, be guided on a house tour of the historic 1923 McGroarty home, or just sit back and enjoy the beautiful atmosphere.

McGroarty Arts Center and Maria Bodmann are dedicated to providing a free, high quality creative outlet and activities in the art of puppetry for children of all ages. The Celebrate Puppetry Festival and related events promote creativity, teamwork, understanding, respect, and tolerance through experience and involvement in a creative and cultural art form in a healthy, safe and positive environment.

For more information about how you can participate in the Celebrate Puppetry Festival or about any of McGroarty Arts Center’s visual and performing arts classes and programs, please contact the Center at 818-352-5285 or www.mcgroartyartscenter.org.