PUPPETQUEERS
Call for acts for our next puppet slam is open until March 22! Click on the call of acts poster to go to the form.
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Show date: Sunday, April 27, 2025
Location: Center on Halsted at 3656 N Halsted St, Chicago, IL 60613
LINDSEY BALL
Creator & Co-Curator
(they, them)
Lindsey Ball (they/them) is an artist, maker, puppeteer, clown, and crybaby.
Ball is the creator and curator of PUPPETQUEERS (@puppetqueers), an all queer puppet slam in Chicago, as well as an ensemble member of the DIY, experimental, performance art collective Stop Motion Plant (@stopmotionplant).
Recent projects include original work-in-progress New But Familiar featured in the Fussy Cloud Puppet Slam Vol. 25: Queer Edition in Seattle, original work-in-progress Green, which was featured in both the PUPPETQUEERS and Rough House’s Nasty, Brutish, and Short puppet slams, pieces featured in the haunted puppet peep show Rough House’s House of the Exquisite Corpse, Collective Summ’s All is Blue & Yellow, an original puppet & clown show for dogs, & Juana and the Missing Mayan Book by Rocio “Chio” Cabrera. Ball’s original work-in-progress Kopfkino debuted in Berlin, Germany and was additionally presented at the Malta Festival in Poznań, Poland, as well as several locations across Chicago. Ball has also presented work at the Letni Letna New Circus and Theatre Festival in Prague and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. Ball yearns to make work that encourages intimacy and explores where fantasy and reality intersect, but also just kind of wants to disappear into a really good book. Free Palestine. Fuck the cops. Long live the queers.
KEVIN MICHAEL WESSON
Co-Organizer & Co-Curator
(he, they)
Kevin Michael Wesson (he/they) is a proudly unrepresented puppeteer/deviser based in Chicago, originally from Tampa, FL (B.A. theatre arts, University of South Florida). Recent credits include: Leonardo! & Christmas Carol (Manual Cinema), “Where we go together” or The Flashlight Play (Theatre Nobody), Dog or Cats; Augmented Body (Steppenwolf LOOKOUT), House of the Exquisite Corpse I-IV (Rough House Theater), All is Blue & Yellow (Collective Summ), Deepen the Heart (Stop Motion plant), Elements of Style (The Neo-Futurists),The Dr. Seuss Experience (Kilburn Live). His works have been mentioned in American Theatre Magazine, No Proscenium, The Puppetry Journal, NPR, nomination for the National Puppet Slam, and various curation for/residencies with Links Hall, Chicago Puppet Lab, The National Puppetry Conference, The Valdez Theater Conference, & The Intuit: Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art. A firm believer in DIY ethos, they currently organize works-in-progress & community programming for the Chicago-based puppet theatre company, Rough House Theater, the performance art company, Stop Motion Plant, Physical Theater Festival Chicago, and the experimental free theatre outfit, Theatre Nobody.
LEAH LARA
Associate Producer & Co-Curator
(they, them)
Leah Lara (they, them) is a black nonbinary puppeteer and 3-D illustrator originally Dallas Tx. A proud Puppet Council member, they received their BFA from Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) where they majored in Illustration. Their work often investigates the black femme experience while drawing on dark and whimsical fairy tale archetypes and themes. Utilizing fairytales as a way to reexamine social structures, behaviors, social hierarchies, and biases. Most importantly they strive for their work to be a catalyst for community, and connection.They love working with their hands, and stick to the commitment of writing, designing, and performing one original puppet show a year. Since relocating to and returning to their childhood home Chicago; they have participated in The Samon Sister Show at Color Club, WonderWagon, and of course, PUPPETQUEERS. They also recently presented development of their newest show, Fish Sermon under The Chicago Puppet Lab. They are currently continuing that show’s development as a Dark Matter Resident at Elastic Arts.
