Friday, March 4, 2011

Kamishibai Box.

What is a Kamishibai Box? Funny you should ask.
Kamishibai, in Japanese, means Paper Theatre. And these amazing contraptions are a traditional means of story telling.

A small, portable wooden box that opens out to become a theatre. A3 sized cards are placed inside, illustrating a story. The story teller moves the cards from front to back as the story progresses.
My dear friend Jackie Kerin (story teller, writer, musician and nursery buddy) is the proud owner of this one.

Beautiful, isn't it? To see the genuine article just takes your breath away.

It was researched, designed and lovingly constructed by our mutual friend Ted, the master craftsman.

You can read more about this Kamishibai here.

Jackie has already taken it out on its maiden voyage and entertained us all at the Newport Fiddle and Folk Club. She had us all spell-bound with the first story from her own series, Tales of Split-Dog.
Jackie illustrated the cards herself, and did a sterling job. She has comissioned some more story cards to be made by various artists. I have been working on a more traditional tale. Stay tuned!

1 comment:

  1. I learned something new! Thanks for that. SHall look forward to seeing a performance some time.

    ReplyDelete