Puppeteer pulls the strings
Mirjam Busch, a Christchurch artist, is never short of company. The host of string puppet characters she has created are always close at hand in her Woolston home.
An orchestra conductor complete with music stand, Christchurch's “Wizard." a nagging housewife, and a general are just some of the “friends" she has chosen to show at the C.S.A. Gallery. Ms Busch made 12 characters for the exhibition — which is her first — and hopes to sell them for about $l2O each.
Her puppet making skills were acquired in London at the Battersea Puppet Centre, during a three-month course. Ms Busch has rather simplified these techniques for the puppets she has made since coming to New Zealand with
her husband seven months ago.
She enjoys puppet making as a "lively art." While many arts did not reach the ordinary person, everyone could relate to puppets, said Ms Busch.
To make a puppet she starts with the head, moulding papier-mache over plasticine to get the required features. The body is made of material, with arms and legs of wood, and a wire frame covered with foam and material for the hands. Each is dressed in appropriate clothes. “I use all sorts of bits and pieces. I do not know what the character is going to be when I start. It develops under mv hands." she said.
Working on the skill when she feels like it, Mirjam Busch can take about three
weeks to complete a puppet. She prefers to work as she chooses when the inspiration is there.
Ms Busch's London training taught her how to joint the arms and legs of the puppets, but she has adapted her own more simple method in New Zealand.
Using the simple strings system on each puppet, adults can work the 150cmtall characters quite easily, although Ms Busch feels most people would enjoy them more by hanging them on a wall as decoration.
Mirjam Busch, who is of Dutch-German descent, has done clay sculpture work and sketching, but puppet making is her particular love. She has also tried her hand at glove puppet making, but this is a skill she has yet to develop.
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Press, 9 February 1983, Page 24
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361Puppeteer pulls the strings Press, 9 February 1983, Page 24
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