OUR LATEST NEWS…

Preparing for the Annual Show

Will these Paperhand sketchbook ideas end up as puppet creations for this year’s show? Only time will tell…

The ideas are flowing for our 2023 summer show, the band and cast are 90% figured out, and we have some very exciting additions to the line up – to be announced soon. We are booked for the Forest Theatre in Chapel Hill for the weekends of August 4th through September 17th, and for the NC Museum of Art for September 22nd through September 24th. Our shows are held Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights at 7:00 p.m. with a 6:20 p.m. pre-show. There will also be a show on Labor Day Monday. Matinees will take place on September 10th and 17th starting at 3:00 p.m. with a 2:20 p.m. pre-show.

Top priority at present is to get all of the people we need in place, especially INTERNS! Please help us to spread the news about this creative opportunity. Each year we have positions for at least 5 interns to help with our summer production. Interns assist with puppet building and may choose to perform as puppeteers in the show. We are looking for people with a desire to learn and a great attitude! Letters of interest and some sort of portfolio should be submitted by email by no later than March 15th. Learn more about Internships with Paperhand: http://paperhand.org/get-involved/

Last Year in Review

Our fall/winter 2022 season was a busy one, with a successful 5-week puppet-making residency in the Dominican Republic and several other activities taking place including shows, festivals, local markets, protests, and parades. Thank you for your interest in Paperhand’s work and for all of the support you’ve provided through the years. We really appreciate it and look forward to seeing what new adventures 2023 will bring.

Our 2022 show was a success!

Our 22nd annual giant puppet show saw larger audiences than ever before. Thank you and let’s do it again soon!

For the 2022 show, Paperhand took an adventurous dive into the paradoxical nature of time. Paper, cloth, and cardboard were transformed into creatures and characters of all shapes and sizes, then came alive in a parade of primordial pageantry!

Paperhand was thrilled to work with the amazing performer, writer and activist Eli Nixon!

We were inspired and informed in our work creating this summer’s pageant by Eli’s incredible new book Bloodtide.

Bloodtide attempts queer futurity, without mythologies of settler
innocence, and with sustained recognition that time extends through
our ancestors: recent ones, bog bodies, slithering fern dwellers and
primordial beasts with telsons ruddering behind. It’s a holiday
marking our relation to place and thus the necessity of making
reparations and contributing to land return projects. Bloodtide
promotes horizontalist structure building practices through pageantry,
crabaoke (altered lyrics), naturedrag, cardboard sculpting, feasting
and other hands-on locally oriented, commemorative & survivalist
practices. Bloodtide posits that shared homage and attention to
horseshoe crabs might further all repair efforts and other
insufficient necessities for our collective and individual healing/
transformation.

If you would like to buy a copy, you can do it here.


Listen and download the music of ‘The Meanwhile Clock and Other Impossible Dances’

Did you enjoy the music from ‘The Meanwhile Clock and Other Impossible Dances’? If so, you can keep listening to it by procuring the album online at the link provided below:


Books are in stock now, and are available for purchase
online and at:

Paperhand events, The General Store in Saxapahaw, McIntyre’s Books in Fearrington Village, Flyleaf in Chapel Hill, Quail Ridge in Raleigh

“The handsome volume is also a triumph against the subtle forces that always threaten the legacy of the live arts…

All through the book, a cascade of vivid full-page images and illustrations feature an astonishing array of larger-than-life mythic, iconic, and archetypal figures drawn from [sources] across the globe. Dragons and phoenixes fly across its pages.”


-Byron Woods for The Indy

*Shows! Workshops! Calls for volunteers!*

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