ralph lee's puppets

 chanda's modern dance teacher borrows masks for her rainforest dance. these are three extra she isn't using this year, so chanda and i were given the task of returning them to their maker, puppeteer ralph lee. i couldn't resist taking a few pics of them first. they're beautifully made. above is the crocodile mask . . 

 and two monkey masks . . 

 an exhibit of ralph's puppets in his apartment complex that changes seasonally.

ralph's company is the mettawee river theatre company. in september they will be at the cathedral of st. john the divine, here in new york. i hope to be there! during the summer they will be touring upstate new york, vermont and massachusetts. will they be near you, eva? you can see the schedule here.

 we walked back along the river and were surprised to see that the playground was open. often, in past years, it hasn't opened until after memorial day, but it was just so warm today that i guess they had to open it!

rainforest tech

 chanda had her rainforest dance technical rehearsal today at the theatre.

 her costume . . 

and these are the masks made by ralph lee . . i've seen his work several times here in the city. one of the shows was in 2001 right before 9/11. the girls were very little! it was a funny show for them to see. i believe korrina remembers it rather well. it was called communications from a cockroach, and was performed downtown in the hudson river park across from warren street, not far from the world trade center. i remember looking at the giant puppets and then looking off into the distance at the twin towers and then out to the river. it had been a beautiful day and i had felt so free to be out with the girls. we had traveled all the way from brooklyn. i don't know how i heard about the performance. the audience was rather small that day! but ralph lee and the mettawee river theatre do fabulous work.

here chanda is admiring the dress she and morgana made for her to wear to sturbridge in 2009. ellen is now using it as one of the costume party dresses for her garden party dance.

rainforest is a dance about the destruction of the earth's beautiful jungles. however, ellen is a person who sees the world in a positive light, so at the end of the dance, after the people have entirely denuded the trees you see above, children enter from the wings with new plants to regrow the forests that were destroyed.

chanda is a bird in this dance. other animals that appear are monkeys, a cheetah, a deer, and a frog.

with the children who go to sleep as the forest regrows . .