Peek over the shoulder and into the mind of a giant swamp monster as she scrolls through a series of monster apps puppeteered on her cardboard smartphone. Within the frame of her phone, a variety of shenanigans come to life, offering a playful poke at how our cellphone use connects and distracts us. At a deeper level, the content within the scrolling is a call for resourceful creativity and activism in the shadow of the climate crisis. This 30 minute performance is built entirely from reclaimed materials, and features the many monsters that inhabit the gallery walls of Leroy’s Place….
The most recent project in a line of ambitious narrative projects created by the Leroy’s Place team, “Doomscrolling” is their first long form live puppetry performance, and development is on-going. The piece, originally conceived by collaborative team Jacques Duffourc and Serene Bacigalupi, features the work of over 40 + artists and musicians. At Leroy’s Place, we believe there are no better mediums than art and humor to bring awareness to social and environmental issues. While the show playfully pokes at our modern relationship with technology, the performance is ultimately a gentle call to action for climate justice.
With a specific consciousness toward defending the Louisiana coastline that is right in our backyard, “Doomscrolling” stands in support of Healthy Gulf, a non-profit organization that works to reverse the long pattern of overexploitation of the Gulf’s natural resources. Proudly built using entirely reclaimed materials and hand dyed fabrics, “Doomscrolling” is a living example of the message it conveys to its audience. Each performance has a non-profit partner, so if audience members are inspired, they can learn more or sign up to volunteer at every show. So far, we’ve partnered with Healthy Gulf and The Promise of Justice Initiative, and we hope to continue to build our community partnerships.
This humorous and darkly relatable production made its debut run in 2023, but you can follow along—or join us in person— as we share more in-progress performances at the New Orleans Giant Puppet Festival in April 2024. We’ll continue to share sneak peeks of the creative process here, and show more from behind-the-scenes as this project that began in August 2022 continues to progress and evolve.
This project was developed in part by the generous support of a grant from The Platforms Fund—a collaborative effort of Antenna, Ashe Cultural Art Center, Junebug Productions and the Andy Warhol Foundation—that fuels artistic projects for social change.
