It’s been a busy start to the year at Puppet Animation Scotland, with MANIPULATE Festival kicking off on 28th January and wrapping up on the 5th February. We were delighted to welcome back live audiences again, enjoying a programme of live theatre, workshops, networking, installations and film. If you took part in MANIPULATE 2022, we’d love to hear your thoughts – please fill in our survey, and to thank you we will enter you into a draw to win 2 tickets to MANIPULATE 2023. The survey will close at the end of February.
Looking forward to MANIPULATE 2023 and beyond, we’re currently hiring 1-2 freelance creative professionals with knowledge of the visual performance landscape to work with the organisation on an ad-hoc basis, attending events and festivals to be considered for inclusion in our festival and touring programmes. This is an exciting new pilot venture funded through Creative Scotland’s Radical Care Fund, which supports organisations within the arts, screen, and creative industries to try out new approaches to support their workers with caring responsibilities. At Puppet Animation Scotland we believe that it’s critical to invest in new ways of working if we want to see long-term change in our sector, and so we’re delighted that Creative Scotland are supporting us to explore a new model for programming work.
You can find out more about the Programme Consultant vacancies here. We would particularly like to hear from applicants who have caring responsibilities or other barriers which may have prevented them from taking up curatorial opportunities in the arts. The deadline for applying is Wednesday 16 March at 12 noon.
Meanwhile, we also have an exciting opportunity for Scottish-based puppeteers. As part of our long-term aim to bring MANIPULATE Festival to new and diverse audiences, we are looking at ways to get out and into the city, interacting with audience members who may never have experienced puppetry and visual theatre before. We’re planning an opening event at MANIPULATE in 2023, and as part of this we would like to commission the construction of a large, illuminated puppet which can be operated by a minimum of 1 or maximum of 4 people. We are at this stage seeking expressions of interest from puppeteers in Scotland and are asking artists to pitch a rough concept and budget for their idea.
Find out more about this opportunity and how to apply here. The closing date for expressions of interest is Monday 14 March 2022 at 5pm.