Plaskitt Lecture

[Punch'n'Judy]

Attended a talk called Muppets, Puppets and Robots last night by Nigel Plaskitt at the Puppet Centre, Battersea. All very interesting, and he had a few characters with him, John Major from Spitting Image, the ITV Digital Monkey, one of the Hoobs, Louise Gold's Baby, Hartley Hare from Pipkins and an Avenue Q Kate Monster.

Not overly well attended though, which is a shame. It was the last in a series of five lectures, collectedly called Puppetry in Progress, some of which have been fascinating (Ronnie Burkett for example) and one of which sent me to sleep!

J

 

[BlueFrackle]

I didnt even know about this. Maybe thats why it wasnt well attended?

 

[Punch'n'Judy]

There was an email about it sent to all PUK members.

 

[Buck-Beaver]

It's a shame to hear that such a great event wasn't better attended. One area where I think all the puppetry organizations like UNIMA, PofA, PUK, etc. need to do a much better job is outreach. Many of these organizations are challenged with shrinking membership and poor attendance at events during a time when it seems like more people than ever are interested in puppetry so the problem seems to be poor communication and marketing rather than a lack of interest.

 

[Luke]

Yeah i would have liked this, these kind of places need to reach out to non-members when they have a big event coming up, and it'd probably attract new ones. A lot of people do a great job with blogs and forums on this though, i should keep up with them more.

 

[Punch'n'Judy]

It is frustrating, I sit on the committee of both PUK and a smaller Punch and Judy organisation (the PJF) and member apathy is rife. It probably didn't help that the event was free, so people rang and reserved tickets, but weren't too bothered about missing it.

 

[Buck-Beaver]

The problem - I believe any way - with most puppetry organizations is that especially after they have been around for awhile they begin to simply assume they have a right to exist and the membership should support them, rather than the organization supporting the membership. In other words, they have the system backwards.

If puppetry organizations don't actively and consistently serve the needs of their membership they won't exist or they'll just shrink and become irrelevant. It's just that simple. People often get upset and defensive when this sort of discussion takes place, but in all honesty I ask the question what specifically have these organizations done today to help their members? And if they did something today that's great, what are they going to wake up and do tomorrow? Because that's the only way organizations grow and thrive.

The excuse (and it's a poor one) that usually gets used for why that approach isn't used is that there aren't enough volunteers, no time, apathetic membership, etc. are complete and utter nonsense. I would argue that just a handful of small individuals - most of them members of this forum - have done much, much more to develop and promote interest puppetry in the past few years than any of the established puppetry organizations. What's lacking if anything is will and new ideas.

I just checked some stats and in the last month, PuppetBuilding.com attracted over 3,000 new (unique) visitors who are obviously actively seeking puppetry information. And that's just one site. There's also Puppet Buzz, Swazzle's site, Puppeteers Unite, my PuppetVision Blog, etc. which attract thousands more people.

The problem isn't a lack of interest in puppetry, the problem is the established organization aren't actively serving the needs of the people who are interested in puppetry in a way that's meaningful to them.

 

[puppetsmith]

Though I hate to say out loud, personally I've been very disappointed since joining the PofA, and I agree with your point of view, Buck.

I joined the PofA last year. Signed up as a company (Project Puppet). I heard from the local chapter a few months after I signed up asking me if I could teach a workshop. I worked up a pretty sweet 3-4 day class, and I never heard back from them again. I don't know if they didn't like the price (which really was a deal with most of the materials included) or if it was more extensive than what they had in mind, etc. The point is...that's all the contact I've had with the local chapter of the PofA since I joined. I thought there would be regular meetings, activities, workshops, etc. I thought there would be and in reality there should be. Otherwise, what's the point? Plus I had trouble at first even receiving copies of the Puppetry Journal and Playboard.

And it's true, it seems the organization is very concerned with waning membership, but is not motivated enough to do something about it. They say they are concerned, but their actions speak otherwise. Or, at the very least, the don't know how to go about improving.

And I also agree that interest in puppets and puppetry is not lacking. I get emails every day from people interested in the Project Puppet patterns for use in their own projects (commercial or personal). And I love it when our customers send in pictures or write in about how they used the patterns and update us on their projects. I know we probably only hear about 10% of the success stories. The others are having too much fun to take the time to write in. Personally I feel that puppetry is in store for a great resurgence. I think we're in the beginning stages. Though it was dealt a blow by the novelty of computer animation some years ago, I think people are coming back around, viewing computer animation, as it should have been viewed in the beginning, as a tool, not a replacement. Puppetry will have a magic that computer animation will never have and I think more and more people are realizing it.

So what now? Time for a revolution?

 

[Luke]

I certainly don't think the lack of awareness of Puppetry groups or their small membership has ANYTHING to do with actual interest in puppets. You've only got to look at the reality TV variety shows "Britain's Got Talent" and "America's Got Talent", massively popular and both featured puppeteers, who got quite far on both shows. Also there was Gordon here who recently had his puppets featured on the Spielberg reality show. Although it's not doing much good for the Muppets right now, mainstream interest in puppetry is beginning to skyrocket.

So yeah maybe its been a bit of a closed club before or maybe they just didn't get much support and got tired of wasting their efforts, but now is a good time for people with groups to hold events, try to get publicity and increase their membership and awareness of them. If some people or organisations weren't interested in them maybe they will be now.

 

[Buck-Beaver]

I joined the PofA last year. Signed up as a company (Project Puppet). I heard from the local chapter a few months after I signed up asking me if I could teach a workshop. I worked up a pretty sweet 3-4 day class, and I never heard back from them again. I don't know if they didn't like the price (which really was a deal with most of the materials included) or if it was more extensive than what they had in mind, etc. The point is...that's all the contact I've had with the local chapter of the PofA since I joined. I thought there would be regular meetings, activities, workshops, etc. I thought there would be and in reality there should be. Otherwise, what's the point? Plus I had trouble at first even receiving copies of the Puppetry Journal and Playboard.

This seems to be sadly typical of most struggling puppet guilds and organizations, they expect support from people rather than offering it. If you're a business and you say "please buy my products, we're a really great business and we have a great history" you're not going to stay in business very long and if you do you'll never be very successful.

The only way to attract customers/members/people is by offering them something they need and/or solving a problem that they have.

I know Project Puppet is a business and we're discussing non-profit groups here, but the two aren't that different and if you don't mind me using you as an example for a moment Bezalel, I think PP is a great example of how to find success by helping people. For years there was a need for really good, really simple puppet patterns that would enable anybody to build a professional looking puppet. I can't tell you how many times I heard people ask for that before PP came along. Everybody loves your patterns and gets excited about new ones because they solve real problems that people who want to build puppets have and they fulfill a real need.

People will gladly pay money to companies or organizations that help them and solve their problems.

I am convinced that any local (or national) puppet guild on the planet could be turned around - boosted membership, boosted interest and a raised public profile - simply by deciding to devote one year to doing nothing except every week doing just one interesting creative thing to promote puppetry and the puppet artists in the guild's area. Talk to the local school board and help them put together puppet activities and lesson plans for teachers, organize a puppet slam, start a blog, generate local news coverage for puppeteers and puppet events. There are zilllions of different things that can be done that cost little or no money.

And they shouldn't do it for money, or membership fees or ask for anything in return. They should do it because the organization believes in helping people interested in puppetry and promoting the art form. In the beginning it will seem like there's no point and nobody cares but if with a little creativity, faith, time and patience amazing things will eventually start to happen.