PUPPET THEATRE IN FINLAND

The tradition of puppet theatre performances in Finland has a time span of only a hundred years. Since the war, puppet theatre has become established in Finland thanks to the persistence of strong-willed woman artists who have taken this formerly belittled art form to success against all odds. Annikki Setälä, the writer, ran her own puppet theatre in Lapland from the 1940s to 1960s, and in the 1950s Helsinki-based puppeteer Mona Leo raised the Finnish puppet theatre to international fame with her theatre, rooted in a profound vision of the significance of fairy tales for human development.

Today, puppet theatres have a major role in the field of Finnish children's theatre. Touring has been a must and a matter of course, in spite of the long distances involved in a country spanning a thousand kilometres. For some twenty years, both the artists' self-confidence and the trust shown by the audience have become reality. Modest yet persistent, puppet theatres have brought drama to grass roots level, close to their audience. About half of the officially recorded children's theatre performances are carried out by the four state-supported theatres; last year, they gave almost 1,400 performances to more than 120,000 viewers. Although the competition for audiences may sometimes cause friction in a small country, Finnish puppet theatres have shown themselves to be capable of successful co-operation; one example of this is the current Puppet Theatre Theme Year in the Finnish theatre world.

International interaction has been an essential part of the development of puppet theatre during its entire history; as is typical for Finnish culture in general, influences have been drawn from both east and west. Moreover, puppet theatre has been found to be a handy medium for conveying national culture and literature, from folk tales to the Kalevala.

The Decades of Growth and Establishment

During the last few years, attenders of puppetry festivals have had the opportunity to follow one Finnish performance that easily captures the attention of even large audiences. Alone on the stage there stands Sirppa Sivori-Asp with her puppets. Her performance, Matkalla kymmenen valtakunnan taa (A Far Away Land), is based on her own experiences and tells about the loss and change in a child's world during wartime. Marked with optimism and courage, the performance manages to convey this feeling to its viewers as well.

In 1971, Sirppa Sivori-Asp was one of the founders of Vihreä Omena, a professional puppet theatre, and remained its artistic director until the 1990s. In addition to her own professional work, she has been a major figure in the development of Finnish puppet theatre at large. In 1984, she was involved in the foundation of the Finnish chapter of UNIMA (Union Internationale de la Marionnette), chairing it for a long time. In 1992 she was elected President of the international umbrella UNIMA. The current artistic director of Vihreä Omena, Ulla Raitahalme, has launched co-operation with the British Norwich Puppet Theatre and the Swedish Tittut Theatre.

The 1970s also saw the foundation of four other professional puppet theatres, all of which have a strong, original artistic profile.

Teatteri Hevosenkenkä was established in Espoo in 1975 by director Kirsi Aropaltio and visual artist Sara Siren. The ensemble has since created a great number of new Finnish scripts for puppet theatre, and introduced puppet theatre into the Finnish National Theatre, where the visits of Hevosenkenkä are now a permanent part of the programme.

Vaasa, a coastal city some 400 kilometres north-west of Helsinki, remained as a major centre of Finnish puppet theatre for a long time. For over ten years, Vaasan kesä, a drama festival organised every summer, imported many top names from international puppet theatre to Finland. In 1976, puppet theatre Peukalopotti was established in the city; later, its artistic director Kristiina Hurmerinta and a Polish director, Anna Proszkowska, together created Pandoran näyttämö (Pandora's Stage), a highly visual "theatre of images" aimed at grown-up audiences. Both theatres were closed in 1996.

In 1977 Maija Baric, a Finnish graduate from the Academy of Performing Arts (AMU) in Prague, founded Nukketeatteri Sampo in Helsinki together with her husband Bojan Baric, a puppeteer and a composer. Sampo is renowned for its brilliant marionettes, but also utilises a variety of other puppet types. The naïve, humorous and musical puppets Tohelo and Torvelo have become popular through children's programmes on TV.

Today, the only professional puppet theatre outside Helsinki is Teatteri Mukamas, founded in 1979 in Tampere. The visuality and theme content of its performances are essentially the creation of two artists, director Mansi Stycz and set designer Anna-Liisa Tarvainen. The peacefully-paced performances respecting the child are invariably accompanied by live music. The enchantment and counterforces of the fairy tale make their presence felt gently. The theatre has co-operated with the Czech Drak Theatre and the Russian Kostroma Puppet Theatre. Mansi Stycz currently holds the chair of UNIMA-Finland.

The artistic potential of Finnish puppet theatre has been greatly influenced by two freelance artists, Kirsti Huuhka and Mirjami Skarp; they have created puppets for professional and amateur groups as well as for TV. The popularity of puppetry has been given an extra boost by puppetry houses located all over Finland, such as Musta ja Valkea Ratsu in Sysmä, the soul of which is puppeteer Eeva-Liisa Holma-Kinnunen.

Finnish Solo Puppeteers

A typical feature of Finnish puppet theatre is the large number of small professional solo theatres. Today, there are about ten such theatres around Finland. The puppeteers are self-employed or work on a freelance basis, only occasionally obtaining state grants.

The performances of solo theatres are inherently bound up with the personal expression of the performers, the more so as many puppeteers also create their own scripts, puppets, and sets. Over half of the Finnish solo puppeteers are men. Most performers have a versatile drama training, but quite a few come from a totally different background in a variety of fields. Solo theatre performances more or less cover the whole of Finland, arriving flexibly where their audiences are: day care centres, schools, public libraries, and institutions. Their performances have not been officially recorded, but a rough estimate of 50,000 viewers annually is probably close the truth.

Amateurs Bring Life to the Regions

According to the records of UNIMA-Finland, there are some 60 actively operating puppet theatre troupes around Finland: their long-span operation has contributed strongly to the invigoration of puppet theatre. The oldest groups have been operating for over twenty years. The amateur troupes cover the great cultural and regional variety well: the southernmost group operates in the Swedish-speaking Åland, and the northernmost in the Sami area of Lapland. The networks of day care centres and public libraries have also contributed a great deal to the growing interest in puppetry, training active performers as well as audiences.

The Northernmost Dimensions of Internationality

Throughout their existence, Finnish puppet theatres have easily crossed borders and participated actively in international festivals all over the world. Zambia is one of the farthermost links: its recently founded puppet theatre organisation UNIMAZA operates under the auspices of UNIMA-Finland. Interaction has naturally been the most active with Finland's neighbouring areas. Close contacts within the Nordic countries have resulted in shared training and strategies in international fora.

The Baltic Puppet Theatre Festival, organised annually in one of the Baltic countries, was launched in 1992. Puppet theatre networks have also been created in the Barents area in the north for a few years now. The first small-scale festival of the area will be arranged in Kalix in northern Sweden later this year, and the co-operation will continue in Rovaniemi, Finland, in 2000; the event will also mark the centenary of Annikki Setälä's birth.

The Rejuvenation of Puppet Theatre

Training in puppet theatre has been parallel to the development of the field in general. In addition to a variety of courses, there is now full-time professional and advanced training available.

In 1983, the Theatre Academy in Helsinki organised an eight-month retraining course for unemployed professionals; it was headed by puppeteer Maija Baric. Her other contributions include comprehensive courses for kindergarten teachers and nurses, organised for over ten years now, and two books on the subject. On the initiative of Kristiina Hurmerinta, amateurs were provided with intermittent training sessions in Vaasa between 1987 and 1991; the teachers came from the Wroclaw Institute of Puppet Theatre in Poland.

The main teacher of the first 3.5-year course training puppet theatre professionals at the Turku School of Art and Communication was Kitta Sara and the artistic director was Michael Meschke, a Swedish puppeteer. The school is now part of Turku Polytechnic, providing a 4-year course starting next autumn and coordinated by Ari Ahlholm, a former student representing the new generation of puppet theatre.

Where will the new graduates find employment? Some of the future professionals will be employed by the four permanent professional theatres, and some will no doubt take up a solo career or establish their own groups. Art education for young people, amateur groups, and increasing TV programme production will also create a demand for professional puppeteers.

The future of puppet theatre in Finland is looking good. The younger generation is now expected to bring in new, fresh ideas to reinvigorate the field. The stereotypes often connected with puppet theatre will inevitably dissolve as long as the art of puppetry continues to cross boundaries and to develop strong interaction with other fields of art.

LEILA PELTONEN

The author is a Rovaniemi-based puppeteer and a Board Member of UNIMA-Finland.