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The Puppet Show
Poster
1916 (made)
1916 (made)
| Artist/Maker | |
| Place of origin |
This poster advertises The Puppet Show, a programme of marionette plays performed by the Gair Wilkinson Marionettes on Saturday, 11 March 1916 at the Margaret Morris Theatre in King's Road, Chelsea. This small theatre staged music, drama and dance, performed by adults and children. It was founded by the dancer, choreographer and dance teacher, Margaret Morris (1891-1980) who was teaching and performing her new system of natural, expressive modern dance. With her partner John Duncan Fegusson, she mixed socially with many local leading artists and writers of the day who met at the club she established attached to her theatre, through which she came to know the Wilkinsons.
Arthur Wilkinson (1882-1957) was inspired to make puppets by seeing toy puppets in Italy and started as a puppeteer touring England in a caravan in spring 1912 with his wife Lily, in search of a simple way of life. With them was his much younger brother Walter, who went on to become a puppeteer himself. To amuse their young children Arthur carved some puppets and gave the occasional show as they travelled. By 1916 Arthur and Lily returned from a stay in Florence to their house in Lechworth Garden City with the remarkable troupe of puppets Arthur had carved in Florence, now in the V&A. The troupe included the characters Blackasnight, Lord Dryasdust, and Harlequin, illustrated on this poster in Wilkinson's drawing, and part of the collection.
Arthur Wilkinson (1882-1957) was inspired to make puppets by seeing toy puppets in Italy and started as a puppeteer touring England in a caravan in spring 1912 with his wife Lily, in search of a simple way of life. With them was his much younger brother Walter, who went on to become a puppeteer himself. To amuse their young children Arthur carved some puppets and gave the occasional show as they travelled. By 1916 Arthur and Lily returned from a stay in Florence to their house in Lechworth Garden City with the remarkable troupe of puppets Arthur had carved in Florence, now in the V&A. The troupe included the characters Blackasnight, Lord Dryasdust, and Harlequin, illustrated on this poster in Wilkinson's drawing, and part of the collection.
Object details
| Categories | |
| Object type | |
| Title | The Puppet Show (published title) |
| Materials and techniques | Printing ink on paper |
| Brief description | Poster advertising The Puppet Show by the Gair Wilkinson Marionettes at the Margaret Morris Theatre, Saturday, 11 March 1916 |
| Physical description | Black and white pictorial and typographic poster. |
| Dimensions |
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| Credit line | Gabrielle Enthoven Collection |
| Object history | NB. While the term 'blackamoor' has been used in this record, it has since fallen from usage and is now considered offensive. The term is repeated in this record in its original historical context. |
| Summary | This poster advertises The Puppet Show, a programme of marionette plays performed by the Gair Wilkinson Marionettes on Saturday, 11 March 1916 at the Margaret Morris Theatre in King's Road, Chelsea. This small theatre staged music, drama and dance, performed by adults and children. It was founded by the dancer, choreographer and dance teacher, Margaret Morris (1891-1980) who was teaching and performing her new system of natural, expressive modern dance. With her partner John Duncan Fegusson, she mixed socially with many local leading artists and writers of the day who met at the club she established attached to her theatre, through which she came to know the Wilkinsons. Arthur Wilkinson (1882-1957) was inspired to make puppets by seeing toy puppets in Italy and started as a puppeteer touring England in a caravan in spring 1912 with his wife Lily, in search of a simple way of life. With them was his much younger brother Walter, who went on to become a puppeteer himself. To amuse their young children Arthur carved some puppets and gave the occasional show as they travelled. By 1916 Arthur and Lily returned from a stay in Florence to their house in Lechworth Garden City with the remarkable troupe of puppets Arthur had carved in Florence, now in the V&A. The troupe included the characters Blackasnight, Lord Dryasdust, and Harlequin, illustrated on this poster in Wilkinson's drawing, and part of the collection. |
| Associated objects |
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| Bibliographic reference | Daily News & Reader, 10 March 1916
Puppets have an extraordinary fascination for some minds. Hazlitt, as we are reminded by the Showman of the Gair Wilkinsons' puppet show, which gave an afternoon performance at the Margaret Morris Theatre, in Chelsea, yesterday afternoon thought puppets the best of all entertainments. Maeterlinck wrote a number of plays for marionettes, and Mr Gordon Craig startled the world some time ago by coming to the logical conclusion of his theories that puppets are the only artistic protagonists of the drama.
The Showman yesterday does not believe that they have the impersonality which Mr Craig thought would be a such a valuable asset in dramatic performances, and confesses than they have put many an idea into his head. That is only right, for Mr Wilkinson (the Showman) has given his puppets life. They do everything but talk, and that is the secret of their reality. In the performance of a puppet show the dialogue, though dramatically spoken, is only a kind of label, made necessary by our obtuseness. For the Gair Wilkinson puppets think with profound subtlety, and the verbal translation of their thoughts must necessarily be inadequate. These puppets make great play with their hands. They do not seem British by birth. And they have wonderful joints, so all their limbs are eloquent.
We saw six little dramas yesterday. One of them, 'Black Magic', with vivid snakes dancing to the incantation of Morino the 'Blackamoor', was extraordinarily real; another, a duel between a Cavalier and a Scotchman, had the unexpected violence of a cinema fight. There was a Pimpinella, a dainty damsel, with red hair and wide open, mysterious eyes, with whom we all fell in love. The Gair Wilkinson puppets are not common artists, and the show is a thing to see. |
| Collection | |
| Accession number | S.5-2019 |
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| Record created | January 21, 2019 |
| Record URL |
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