The East Side Freedom Library and Z Puppets Rosenshnoz invite you to a special performance and a conversation

HOW CAN YOU HELP KEEP ALIVE ENDANGERED INDIGENOUS LANGUAGES?

Thursday, October 13, 2022, 7pm – 8pm
Register here to join this event on Zoom.

Join Z Puppets Rosenschnoz for the launch of STAR TURTLE, a musical adventure with a Turtle & Wabbit into the Cherokee language. View the first episode of this family-friendly Cherokee futurism web series and then take part in the discussion by guest activists, educators and artists about creative approaches to revitalizing Native American languages.

Z Puppets’ Creative Director Chris Griffith is a member of the Cherokee Nation who has been creating performances in response to the Cherokee Tribes’ declaration of emergency for their language. Chris and Z Puppets’ Co-Creative Director Shari Aronson will share highlights of Z Puppets’ web series and live touring shows, Say It! Sing It! Play It! In Cherokee and Star Turtle. At this critical time for the language, audiences see, hear and even sing along with Cherokee words.

Joining Z Puppets for a conversation will be their collaborators Hapistinna Graci Horne, Dakota/Lakota Curator and Storykeeper of Mnisota Native Artists Alliance and JW Webster, Cherokee Nation Language Educator.

Tune in for and share unique insights and approaches to activating Indigenous languages.

About the artists:

Z Puppets Rosenschnoz- Since 1998, Co-Creative Directors Chris Griffith and Shari Aronson have been leading people of all ages and abilities into the power of playfulness for feats of imagination. They have created over 30 original shows for family audiences with their inventive mix of handcrafted puppetry, quirky humor and live music. Based in Minneapolis, Z Puppets has earned honors and support nationally from the Jim Henson Foundation, Puppeteers of America, Network of Ensemble Theaters, Parents’ Choice and Creative Child Magazine.

Chris Griffith (Co-Creative Director and Founder, Z Puppets Rosenschnoz) is a Minneapolis producer, director, designer and performer of puppetry who got his start as a street performer. After touring as a comic juggler (featured at Edmonton’s International Street Performer Festival in Canada), Chris was Education Coordinator for In the Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theatre and co-founder and director of Galumph Interactive Theater, NEA-funded participatory theater innovators.

An enrolled tribal member of the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma, Chris has lived most of his life outside the region, longing to learn how to speak and write in Cherokee. Now, he is the first in three generations of his family to study the language. The Star Turtle web series is the next step for Chris to bring his skills as an artist into the urgent effort to keep alive this endangered indigenous language.

Hapistinna Graci Horne (Curator and Storykeeper for Mnisota Native Artists Alliance) is Sisseton Wahpeton Dakota and Hunkpapa Lakota/Dakota. Horne holds a degree in Museum Studies from the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM. As a multimedia artist, Graci has taught and collaborated with In the Heart of the Beast Puppet & Mask Theatre, Barebones, Northern Spark Festival, All My Relations Gallery, Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Eastside Arts Council and MIGIZI Communication. In addition to teaching with Z Puppets, Graci has been on the video production team for their Say It! Sing It! Play It! In Cherokee and Star Turtle series.

Shari Aronson (Co-founder and Creative Director of Z Puppets Rosenschnoz) started her career as a Resident Playwright at Bloomington Playwrights’ Project in Indiana, followed by a McKnight Foundation Screenwriting Fellowship and M.A. in Drama Education. Shari has written plays for family audiences through commissions from the Minnesota History Center, Science Museum of MN, Mill City Museum and Minnesota Cancer Coalition. Theaters nationwide produce Shari’s stage adaptation of children’s book Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins. Shari has received multiple awards for her work from the Minnesota State Arts Board, Metropolitan Regional Arts Council, Jerome and McKnight Foundations. Shari has also developed interactive environments for the MN Children’s Museum and Science Museum of MN.

JW Webster is Wichita State University’s first-ever indigenous language instructor, and he has made it a lifelong mission to preserve the language he could speak before he could speak English. He is one of only 1,200 people who can fluently speak, write, and read Cherokee.

Free and open to all