Go and see: puppetry tips

If you are in Belgium don't miss the Art Day for Children or Kunstendag voor Kinderen this Sunday 16/11. There will be a lot of creative stuff to do and see. For example the show of Theater Tieret, they will play in a tent in Lint their short scientific show about dreams and dreaming Baraque Future. 

Or the show De steltenloper, which is a person walking on stilts... Those long wooden poles... sounds mysterious. (coproduction of De Maan and Nat Gras)

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It will be a special day for us too. Playing Popoty in Gent in the morning and The Cake Story - Koekensprook in the afternoon in Roeselare. May there be more Art days like this! See you!

Kukulu - Koekensprook

Last christmas i gave you my heart!!

Last preparations for the last Kukulu tour this last month of the year! Tomorrow I'll be on my way to Vienna again, and I will be playing our show about Lulu and Joshua. Lulu is Joshua's dog. He found him one day under the Christmas tree (of course!).

I wish you all a beautiful Christmas and I hope you will find under the Christmas tree a dog too!!

:D JOKING!! Have good one, enjoy, eat and relax! See you next year with more lemons and puppets and hopefully some good stuff to read about.

ONE YEAR!

So I totally missed the birthday of this blog!

Happy birthday Lemons and happy birthday Puppets! We were doing quite good. We've got people from many different countries checking out the blog regularly! Thank you all for that!! And we've also got our real own instagram profile! :) What an improvement! But most importantly we have the courage and motivation to go on and bring up some more from the strange world of arts, puppets, and any connected (or disconnected) inspirations!!

A year ago this blog begun with the biiiiiig event in Ghent, the Gentse Feesten Festival. And tomorrow it will all start again and the town will turn into a pulsing festival area. Many people left for holidays because of that, but many others are staying, or coming to town to celebrate in so many ways for ten days.

I'm the one staying. Naturally. And I am already putting together several programs and I am trying to figure out how to see enough shows/concerts and not miss anything important. (Which is really impossible in the amount of gigs!)

I picked three theatre shows which I'd like to recommend you, guys. For those in town, who can go see it during the next week, or for some who can keep it in mind and see these shows on another festivals. These shows tour Europe all year long ;)

1. My personal 'Numero Uno' is the Studio Orka and their Duikvlucht (cooperation with theater Antigone, Antwerpen). This show - Duikvlucht (google translates it as "nosedive") was last summer on the program of Zomer van Antwerpen (another Belgian festival). It was sold out for two months immediately. So I have my tickets already, no risking. Three other shows by Studio Orka, which I've seen before, were a splendid experience, so I guess this one will not be a disappointment. 

(The shows start tonight 19 - 22 july + 25 - 28 july at 15 and 19 o'clock but please find out more here.)

Check the trailer here. It also has English subtitles!

2. If you like new circus, in Belgium you are on the right place. The circus scene is blossoming over here. There will be a lot to see in the Baudelopark in Ghent, where the Jeugdcircus festival takes place (festival of young circus and the shows are for free). Via the Mira Miro festival you'll find circus on a many other locations too. I picked a show I had the pleasure to see once upon a time in Slovakia on the Cirkul'art festival - PakiPaya's show Shake Shake Shake.

Ladies, you don't wanna miss this handsome gentleman ;) 

27 july 15:30 and 19:30

28 july 17:30 and 21:00

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3. Let's not forget about the puppets! As many years before also this year the Puppetbuskers festival goes on. Still at their usual location in the beautiful Patershol on the Trommelstraat. It is probably for the last time that the festival will take it's place there, so you rather won't miss it. The program includes a lot of artists from Belgium, France, Great Britain, Spain and "young talents" from Netherlands, Poland, Hungary, Russia etc... Most of the companies are new to me, but there will be the possibility to see the winner of last year "Young talent" category - Cie La Mandale and their Citizen P. I wrote about them here. 
You can see the show on 24 july in the shopping center Zuid 15:00, 26 july EFTC, Trommelstraat, 16:00.

Enjoy the shows, music, dance, party! Enjoy the beautiful weather! And all of you who can't be here, consider to visit Ghent next year around this time, it's surely worth it ;) 

See you around! ;)

Why do I love Belgium #2

Donkeys! (:

Why do I love Belgium #1

Almost a year ago, when we moved to Belgium I decided to find my top 10 things I love about this country. The first one was clear to me immediately. Biking. Not as a sport (oh my god, no!) but as a way of transportation.

Everybody bikes! Young people, old people, two people, little people, babies (sitting in a special cargo bikes). And the bike roads are wide, and signed and they don't just end somewhere... 

This was last spring. We were testing my brand new bike! Since than he went through a lot of rain, mud, even snow (!), one flat tire and two slight accidents ;) But I keep enjoying it and I look forward to some sunny days on the 'fiets'! 

                                                                                        

The dog in Middelkerke

(Middelkerke is a small town at the sea. Yesterday, while I was collecting new inspiration in this area, I saw him staring at the moon and thinking. Maybe about his dog days. Or about hot dogs.) 

The All Souls' Day in Slovakia

Last weekend we got the chance to visit our family in Slovakia. As an every year tradition, we go prepare the graves of our grand-grand parents and other deceased relatives for the All Souls' Day. We went to Čičmany (one of my most favourite places in the world) and got surprised by snow! We visited the graveyard, but there was too much snow for the decorating of graves and was indeed too cold for it. We just enjoyed a short snowfight, than walked to our cottage, where the lovely slivovica was waiting to warm our bodies from the inside. Hope you had a good holidays, souls ;)

cards

This week wasn't really a good one. And today wasn't good at all... but I made myself happier with these postcards!

Source here and here!

May the weekend be creative (:

fleamarkets

This summer and spring was very rich in fleamarkets. Especially because here, in Belgium, people organize them almost every weekend, just in another part of town. They gather their knick-knacks in front of their houses and sell them for very friendly prices.

Sometimes I'm imagining how the same things rotate in time from market to market, from place to place, from one owner to another...

Rommelmarkt Antwerpsesteenweg, Gent:

Rommelmarkt, Lange Violettenstraat, Gent:

And than, there are those fancy fleamarkets, which became a tourist attraction. The one in Paris is a paradise. But all the rattles, gadgets, bric - and - bracs, gemgaws, gimcracks and whatnots cost just a little too much...  

Les Puces de Saint - Ouen, Paris

Hello Mister, 
we meet everyday, on the same place. You make me smile and always watch the tram. 
Thanks to the unknown author for a good idea!