Join Rough House artistic associate Grace Needlman and learn how to make an amazing reed puppet! 

Reed is a fantastically flexible material for creating giant, lightweight sculptures that can become puppets, masks, lanterns, kites, and more. This introductory class will cover basic techniques for building 3D forms with reed. You will learn to bend, fasten, and cover small-diameter reed using only your own hands, string, glue, and fabric. Create your own reed puppet to take home!

All materials included! Enrollment is on a sliding scale; Equity Scholarship assistance is available in the details of the ticketing page.

About the Instructor

Grace Needlman (they/she) is an independent Chicago-based theater designer and facilitator working with artists and youth to tell meaningful stories and build inspiring learning communities. Grace is a co-creator of The Beatrix Potter Holiday Tea Party (Chicago Children’s Theatre) and the Puppet Wonder Wagon, and a regular designer with House of the Exquisite Corpse (Rough House). Their puppets have appeared at Steppenwolf Theatre, Teatro Vista, The Metropolitan Opera, La Mama ETC, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and more. As Co-director of the Chicago Puppet Lab and a former co-curator of Nasty, Brutish, and Short, Grace works to build equitable pathways for puppeteers in Chicago. Grace has previously managed Studio Programs at Marwen and Youth and Family Programs at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, where they worked to put resources in the hands of young people and connect artists with intergenerational publics. Grace graduated with a BA in fine art from Yale University and an MA in Contemporary Art Theory from Goldsmiths University of London.