News

AN APPEAL TO VIEWERS AND READERS!

Under Hungarian law, companies are entitled to donate part or whole of their company tax directly to any theatre that they choose to specify, instead of transferring it to the Tax Office. The top limit of the sum that may be donated is 80% of the return from ticket sales of the theatre in question.  The donation entails no extra cost for companies but it does involve a certain amount of paperwork. We take this opportunity to kindly request all readers of this website to help our theatre by donating your company tax to us. If you are in a position to help, please contact us at any of the available channels. Your help will be extremely valuable to us. Thank you!

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The greatest event of the summer was our participation at the International Adult Puppet Theatre Festival at Pécs. Our performance, História, won no prize but received a great deal of recognition and sincere words of acknowledgement and thanks from viewers. Because selection for this festival had been extremely strict, being one of altogether six participants from this country was in itself a considerable achievement.

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The new season at our puppet theatre starts at the end of September. In October we are already booked to travel to Prague and perform The Kidnapping of the Sun and the Moon, then in late November we are going to Sweden where we have been invited to give nine performances of Tóbiás and Kelemen.

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September 2010

This summer will be memorable for the tense weeks we spent waiting for the results of our grant applications, being informed that the government would freeze even a portion of the sums extended, and for the general sense of insecurity. At the end of August we found out that the Ministry of Culture would offer partial funding for two new productions (less than the sum we applied for and even out of this sum 66% will be paid and 34% is to be withheld), but the Capital City Council has agreed to fund a third production to the full extent requested. Thus, although this year we were not eligible to apply for operative funding at all, and will have a very difficult season as a result, we  will have plenty of work producing the three new plays.

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June 2010

The success of the premier and further performances of Tóbiás and Kelemen is shown by the fact that we have received an invitation to Sweden for nine performances of this shadow play from the Hungarian Association in that country.

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March 2010

We have received a major sign of acknowledgement from the state – on the national holiday of March 15^th, based on the proposal of the Critics’ Gild, the Minister of Culture gave us the Géza Blattner Award. Although the award was officially addressed to the two founding members, Gábor Siklósi and Klára Fers, we see it as a sign of appreciation for the whole of Figurina and share the joy with all our colleagues.

It is also recent news from the last few days that the Capital City Court has officially registered our new public endowment, the Figurina Cultural Endowment which we then registered with the Office of the Performing Arts. The Endowment will enable our puppet theatre to operate far more efficiently and at higher artistic standard.

We are proud to report that our performances The Fisherman and his Wife and História have been selected by the relevant juries for three highly prestigious puppet theatre and children’s theatre festivals (the Convention of Hungarian Puppet Theatres at Kecskemét, the Kaposvár Children’s Theatre Biennial and the International Festival of Adult Puppet Theatre at Pécs). We have also received an invitation to Bielefeld, Germany for two performances of the hand animation play The Kidnapping of the Sun and the Moon.

In February we started preparing and rehearsing a shadow-play rendering of the verse play Tóbiás and Kelemen by Zoltán Veress, supported by the Sándor Weöres Grant. The premier is going to be on April 18^th at 10.30 in the chamber theatre Kolibri Fészek. After this date the play will be featured at 11:00 and 17:00 hours every Saturday in our puppet theatre at Retek utca.

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September 2009

We’ve done it! Just back from Brazil, which was fantastic! We have made a DVD of the journey which you can order through our usual contact channels or view at the Club of the Puppet Players’ Association one evening at a date to be posted later.

Naturally, besides travelling, during the summer we also offered a great many performances in Hungary, both in Budapest and in the country. Our little theatre near Moszkva tér is closed for a summer holiday. This is a good chance for us to change and improve the working regime, the furnishings and the PR of the theatre.

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July 2009

Earlier this year, in March, we went on a tour of Finland (sponsored by the National Cultural Fund). We performed Grim/m/aces and Microcircus in Helsinki and Tampere to Hungarian families living there and their local friends. Amidst the cold and snow (!) of March we received a warm welcome from the local Hungarian cultural associations who were extremely pleased with our performances.

In April Figurina went to Norwich, UK, to present Grim/m/aces at a professional convention where colleagues highly appreciated the performance.

In May we represented Hungary (along with Vaskakas Puppet Theater) at the World Puppet Festival of Prague. Our programme, a combination of The Kidnapping of the Sun and the Moon and Microcircus performed under the title Manualis, won the prize for Best Animation.

At the end of June we went to Italy to take part at the festival ‘Stra Vaganti’ held in a set of villages near Milan. We performed Microcircus on the piazza of a different village each night, to considerable acclaim.

And in August, if all goes well, we are going to Brazil, to two major puppet festivals! We are very excited and rehearsing Manualis!