LAHORE: The 22nd International Puppet Festival by Rafi Peer Theatre Workshop will start today (Friday) at Rafi Peer Cultural Complex, Gaddafi Stadium.

The three-day festival focuses on the international and local puppet productions and activities for children and the families in a community at the Rafi Peer Cultural Centre and the puppetry museum that can be a special experience for them.

The festival is a celebration of puppetry, local arts and crafts and culture from around the country and it is held annually in spring in Lahore. This year, it welcomes spring with a colourful line-up which includes all the familiar favourite activities such as puppet performances and workshops for children, storytelling, puppet parade and puppet exhibits at the museum.

The puppet performances include those by the artists from Pakistan, Indonesia, Germany and Turkey.

The Rafi Peer Theatre Workshop has been actively involved with puppetry since 1978 and it has hosted internationally renowned puppet festivals along with puppet workshops for children and young adults in schools and festivals across Pakistan. It has been promoting joyful learning by using puppetry as a tool for education and social awareness.

The puppetry groups from Lahore Arts Council, Pakistan National Council of Arts, Rawalpindi, and from other places are participating in the festival. There would also be a performance by the Papermoon Puppet Theatre Indonesia, one from Germany and one from Turkey. A puppet-making workshop, storytelling and a folk music night are also part of the festival.

Published in Dawn, February 15th, 2019