Puppetry Announcements!
Linda Zimmer: Puppet Manipulation GUEST ARTIST
Linda Zimmer is a puppeteer, teaching
artist and expressive arts therapist. After touring with The Lovelace
Marionette Theater in Pittsburgh, she worked on "Mister
Rogers' Neighborhood" where she created the puppets Betty Okanak Templeton, Turkey Express and Old Goat. She developed her own one woman shows including "Lizzies Tune" about labor leader, Mother Jones and "Eleanor's Garden" about
Eleanor Roosevelt. She was interviewed on "Good Morning America" as Rita Saurus, a puppet character in the Read America
program. She also appears as Beatrix Potter in "Puppet Tales From Beatrix Potter" (Linda Zimmer as Beatrix Potter pictured).
The lovable and empathic dog puppets she created for children's hospitals helped kids share their feelings and cope with the trauma of hospitalization. Her work has been documented in national magazines.
Zimmer is co-author of the script for "Max and Nellies Journey with Grief", a film funded by the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation to help children cope with loss and grief.
She lives on an organic farm in the central mountains of West Virginia with her husband, Don Olson, at Blue Rock Farm where they produce maple syrup, rainbow trout, a U-Pick Blueberry patch and maintain an heirloom apple orchard. She builds marionettes in her puppet studio while wrangling cats and poodles.
Her memoir: "Playing With Memory"chronicles her work as expressive arts therapist, lighting up dementia care with music, nature and a very special poodle.
Puppetry graduates work for the following prestigious companies:
- Walt Disney
- Grey Seal Puppet Company
- Little Who Productions, Puppet Pizzazz
- Houston Children’s Festival
- Theatre West Virginia
- The Pittsburgh Children’s Museum
- Holden Puppets
- Kids on the Block
- Nashville Sesame Street Live Touring
