Signal puppeteers Colleen Laliberte and Michael McCamish stand on scaffolding they used to rig ropes to hold his giant dragon puppet.Signal Mountain residents and puppeteers Colleen Laliberte and Michael McCamish recently introduced members of the Glass Street community in East Chattanooga to the art of puppet-making. In partnership with Glass House Collective, she and McCamish offered free classes open to anyone, a project that was made possible through a grant from the Tennessee Arts Commission, Laliberte said.
For two months, they held open studio hours two nights a week in the Mark Making studio on Glass Street to give adults and children in the neighborhood the opportunity to design and build puppets to be a part of the Glass Street Live Celebration held on Sept. 24.
The annual event is part of an effort to bring life back to the historic Glass Street neighborhood, once a bustling commercial area.
“Our studio was visited not only by the neighbors in the Glass Street neighborhood, but also by students from UTC, teachers from the Chattanooga Center for Creative Arts, the Normal Park Museum Magnet School, and from other local professional artists who volunteered to help design and build these puppets with the neighbors on Glass Street,” said Laliberte. “It was a wonderful collaboration.”
The Glass Street neighborhood puppet project was intended to complement a visit by artist Wayne White, a Chattanooga native and former puppeteer for “Pee-Wee’s Playhouse.” This year’s Glass Street Live coincided with the kickoff of White’s Wayne-O-Rama, the start of which was marked by a puppet parade. White built giant puppets of Civil War generals for the event.