Sonia Gechtoff was an American abstract expressionist painter. Her primary medium was painting but she also created drawings and prints.

Carson McCullers, the author of the celebrated piece of fiction ‘The Heart is a Lonely Hunter’ was born as Lula Carson Smith. The author is notable for writing several novels, plays, and short stories which are known for their high literary standards. As a young girl, Lula wanted to become a musician and received piano lessons from the age of ten. She also had plans to enroll at the prestigious Juilliard School of Music in New York City. However a bout of rheumatic fever while she was a teenager forced her to rethink her career options. Her father bought her a typewriter and the youngster started writing stories to pass time during her recovery. She later attended creative writing classes and started writing seriously by the time she was in her late teens. Unfortunately, she was always plagued by health problems from an early age. Long periods of convalescence, however, proved to be the inspiration behind her writing—she began writing her first novel ‘The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter’ while she was recovering from a respiratory illness. The novel which explores the story of a deaf man was a literary sensation and a best seller. The book was also adapted into a film of the same name later on.

Born in Missouri, Walker Evans (1903-1975) is best known for his 1930s and 1940s documentary photographs of the United States. He spent his early career experimentally photographing the streets of New York. From 1935, he worked for the Farm Security Administration and travelled through the mid-West and Southern states of America creating his most important and significant work. His collaboration with the writer James Agee for Fortune magazine also resulted in the groundbreaking book, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men (1941). In 1938, Evans was the first photographer that the Museum of Modern Art in New York honoured with a solo exhibition called Walker Evans, American Photographs.

Born in Philadelphia, McCurry graduated cum laude from the College of Arts and Architecture at the Pennsylvania State University. After working at a newspaper for two years, he left for India to freelance. It was in India that McCurry learned to watch and wait on life. "If you wait," he realized, "people will forget your camera and the soul will drift up into view."

ON A PERSONAL NOTE: When I first saw Ronnie Burkett’s work, I knew I had met “my people.” No, not Ronnie & his team of artists, but the puppets he created. I felt each and every one the individual souls made of wood and donned in intricately, fine made, perfectly designed costumes that augmented the already telling spirit on that stage. I witnessed wood walking on wood and BELIEVED that I was intimately associated with these creatures. I understood that they were made to be in the world in the same way we were all made to be in this world: to be held, to connect with others, to accept who we are, and to wholly experience the world as we were meant to experience it…. and then, go out and tell our stories, share what we’ve learned, and make room for the next spirit/creature/person to have a “ seat at the table” and let the circle of life continue on as it will, as it does. The absolute clarity of spirit, form and personality of each of Burkett’s characters make/made me realize at first sight how beautiful it is to be a type, what it means to be FULLY in your own skin, & that I MUST walk with grace and dignity in MY own shoes, so that I can slip on a pair of another and exhibit the care and empathy of a BURKETT puppet. That’s my goal. That is what I seek. That is what I feel.

Miriam Buether is a German stage designer who primarily works in London theatre. She was born in Germany and studied stage design at Central Saint Martin’s College of Art and Design in London and costume design at the Akademie für Kostüm Design in Hamburg. Her most recent design, TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

Thrilled to be studying with Lake Simon this summer, who is a master puppeteer. Her heart illuminates the ZOOM screen as she carefully guides us along to create Shadow Puppet beauty inspired by the incomparable shadow puppets artists of the theater & film and like that of “Lotte” Charlotte Reiniger.

Charlotte Reiniger was born on June 2, 1899, in the Charlottenburg district of Berlin to Karl and Eleanor (Raquette) Reiniger. She studied at the Charlottenburger Waldschule, where she learned about scherenschnitte, the art of cutting shapes and designs in paper with scissors. The art form originated in China and later became popular in Germany….

Meet Eric Davis…one of my teachers this summer, to whom I am grateful to be learning. He is teaching me how to execute the MOST dangerous performing style ever…the ART OF THE BOUFFON.

Eric Davis is an American actor, comedian, director, writer and clown. Davis is best known for his one-man show Red Bastard and performing in the Cirque du Soleil productions Quidam and the role of Allan Smithee in Iris.