Galapagos puppets set to delight

A scene from the Garden of the Galapagos puppetry show based on Graeme Base's classic children’s book, The Waterhole. (Supplied) 223217_01

Goya Dmytryshchak

One of Melbourne’s first post-lockdown theatre shows is set to delight with giant illuminated puppets based on Galapagos Islands animals and Graeme Base’s classic children’s book, The Waterhole.

Puppet theatre company, A Blanck Canvas, will bring the award-winning book to life in its Garden of the Galapagos show at Seaworks in Williamstown this weekend (December 11 and 12).

The show’s director is Peter Wilson, who directed the ‘Nature’ segment for the opening ceremony of the 2000 Olympics in Sydney.

Executive producer John Barcham said the show was based on Base’s best-selling book about sustainability and the environment.

“Our ambition actually is to create the full production based on the full book and this particular section of the show was created for a performance at Melbourne Zoo a couple of years ago,” he said.

“The puppets are internally illuminated and that is all connected back via WiFi to a control board so that the colours in the puppets can change.

“In addition to that, we have a whole sound and light system that works with this, that works on Bluetooth so we don’t have any wires all over the place.

“It’s sort of low-tech puppetry, high-tech theatre.”

The Garden of the Galapagos is a non-seated show.

It’s on Friday, December 11 and Saturday, December 12, at 5.30pm, 6.30pm, 8.00pm.

Bookings: ablanckcanvas.com/garden-of-the-galapagos/