flora margaret

photos (1-4 from the Festifools flickr group http://www.flickr.com/groups/festifools/pool/show/)
1. lovely skeleton
2. ann arbor mayors john hieftje (heeft-ya)
3. audrey
4. green men…or women?
5. wayne white’s LBJ head from http://buy.beautyisembarrassing.com

This Sunday will be the 7th year of the Festifools event in Ann Arbor and I will once again be out of town. Gah!

This crazy University-Ann Arbor Community event is mostly a parade of giant handmade, paper maché puppets/kinetic sculptures, and many silly fools— in celebration of April Fools day. I think most of the spectators are really celebrating spring, art, community and creativity- my favorites!

The event has expanded to include a homemade luminary parade the Friday night before the event, food stalls and I’m not sure what else because I have never attended!

My daughter and I did help with puppet making one year. We mistakenly thought we were volunteering to make our own large puppets, but it turned out we were just paper machéing, for 3 hours, puppets for the students of the UM professor who started the Festifool event. It was fine, everyone involved was really great, but it wasn’t what we had expected.

One of these old days I am going to watch this fool fest. One day I’m going to make a puppet of my own—which anyone is welcome to do, with their own space and resources. Being in the parade isn’t that interesting to me. I would rather watch, but I imagine there are plenty of fools, or festifools, who would be willing to parade around with a puppet.

You see, I have thought about this.

Instead of making a puppet, I might make something like this creature on stilts…but maybe a friendlier version, so as not to make small children cry.

Or I might make something like Wayne White’s LBJ head (above) featured in the documentary, Beauty is Embarassing, which I really, really want to see. (I have only seen the trailer.)

Or maybe something like Fifi, sans the vehicle, made for Baltimore’s Kinectic Sculpture race (which I am also intrigued by!).

I will definitely not be making anything like the puppets from the play War Horse— I’m a hack, not an artist. Have you seen these puppets?! So fascinating you have to remind yourself they’re not real. (There are many youtubes of these puppets, just search War Horse puppets).

These creative images and possibilities will be percolating in my brain until the right time, space and/or enthusiastic conspirator comes along.

I hope that time is before the next Festifools event. I hope that next year, I will be in town to help contribute to the foolishness! I hope to see you there! And I hope, that you will want to carry my puppet.