The Aethernomicon (image heavy)

[madfishmonger.livejournal.com]

This summer at the Winnipeg Fringe Festival, a friend of mine put on a puppet play. He did the same last year, but this year went all out on the marionettes. He doesn't really have internet access, so I'm posting the pictures. I did the sewing for the play (costumes, curtains etc), and was very happy with the results. I made my first pair of pants for a puppet.

The story revolved around Abdolos - shunned from society for having read the forbidden tomes and for daring to question the wisdom of its leaders. Sent into space with his eyes and tongue removed (puppet gore is so much fun), he is found by the curious god Azahir, who takes a liking to him and grants him a new life....sort of. He pilots alone (with Azahir tagging along to mess with him) into the deepest parts of space where he finds dark and terrible secrets about the origin of humanity... and Cthulu.





My friend, with Azahir. I love his tentacly face! It also gives you an idea of scale.


"C'mon now, give me the knife..."


Assembly time.


Putting the stage together. It had to be assembled and disassembled for every show.





Puppets in storage.


Who's controlling who?


Yay puppets!

The show had live music.


Axahir with Abdolos (before he gets his mask)


Tovarious, teller of tales (the narrator).


Obolon: part man, part machine, all servant of the Old Ones. I wish I had more pics of this one.


The Goloth (above), Abdolos, Azahir, and the Executioner.


The Goloth, creator of Humanity.

Little bitty humans born out of the Goloth! I don't know how to describe how this comes about, but it involves the Goloth turning inside out and the little people falling out of him. I'm not making it sound very good, but it was awesome.

The music man decided the controller for the Goloth needed a paint job.


Abdolos hanging out with a corpse he finds in space (and brings back to life with his spooky powers!)


The tragic end of Abdolos. Puppet gore is so much fun!


Piew piew!
There were three of these guys, and they did a sort of dance as they entered. It was amazing to watch.


Cthulu! He's about six feet long and takes three puppeteers to manipulate, but they still managed to make him look like a floating squid.




One of the puppeteers painted her shoes, I love how these came out!


Thanks for looking :)
If you're interested seeing more, check the Watch and Spectacle Puppet Company's website.