Human Puppetry with Open HeART Space

By Monique Wells, Freelance Writer

I told everybody: "Wear yoga pants. Bring something that you can do the splits in."

It wasn't hard to convince my friends Molly, Cat, and Christie to join me in "Human Puppetry" - put on by a group called Open HeART Space.

We giggled as we approached the building. A woman layered in cotton and dance socks saw us through the door's window. "Are you here for the workshop?" she asked. She seemed surprised to see us. Were we not Puppetry material?

We followed her into a large unfurnished classroom adorned with hanging tapestries. Four lanky men with soft eyes introduced themselves. Exclamations sounded. "New people!" We felt a little misplaced at first, like we'd come to a strangers' graduation party for appetizers.

My pals' applied their spandex (I had worn mine in, an eager beaver). The teacher, Armen, had us sit in a circle formation and we all went 'round and explained our history with movement and what we wanted to get out of the class. He asked me if I had any experience with "contact work." (I momentarily made a mental orgy joke. Was this how they began? I had always wondered). I told him that I had never heard the phrase "contact work" (others giggled, though I was being earnest), but I felt open to it.

For the first 20 minutes we lay on the floor and swooped our limbs in circles around on it. The floor supported our muscles, as if we were making a series of demented snow-angels, as if our toes were the pencil on a geometric compass.

The group circle was resumed. Each person then attempted "contact work" in the center with Armen. He danced slowly, leaning on the exemplary person, allowing the person to lean on him, making circles with the arms of the exemplary person as if they were an elliptical machine at a gym. He danced with one girl like she was a ballerina and wrestled with Molly, as upright as a horse sleeps. He explained that our first exercise in which the floor held our weight was preparing us for others to hold our weight and vise versa. I touched him sparingly, mostly in the fingertips - he was a stranger.

Suddenly there was an anticipatory vibration in the classroom. It was as if a Tibetan monk was teaching P.E. and my turn was coming to climb the rope. I was nervous. Was there a right or a wrong way to "contact?" Was it inappropriate to giggle? Each cell in my body seemed to shake like a numbered ball in a lotto machine, though as a whole I was still.

We partnered up and learned to cue another person's body to move by patting joints. For instance, if Bill was my puppet and I was the puppeteer, Bill would close his eyes and I would gently lift his bicep. The next time I touched his bicep, he would know that I intended him to raise it. I would put Bill in a hunting pose. Then Bill would be the puppeteer. Bill might walk my legs over to a chair, sit me down, and proceed to cue me into the pose of an old woman waiting for a bus. This was Human Puppetry.

Next we resumed our circle to play the puppetry game as a group. Two puppets in the middle were cued by the entire class. This part was quite a hit. It was strange to be creating a human scene, silently, with strangers.

As the class wound to a close, Armen had us close our eyes and hold hands to create noise music. We made a big, dynamic five-minute song complete with beats, whispers, whistles and growing melodies.

Throughout the class we had a series of blissful catching-ons (as we learned new tricks in people-catching or Morse code ankle-tapping). And suddenly we were a fully bonded set of strangers who moved and sang freely. After the song, a giggle-fest hit us like a nor'easter. We left feeling tranquil, wise and happy.