|
Sicilian pupi (rag dolls)
|
The Pupi
The Sicilian pupis, been born to halves the eight hundred, they constitute a particular type of marionette. In little time, thanks to the cleverness and the intuition of the Sicilian artisans, the rudimentary wood pupis and cloth, sees a few decades to Rome before, Naples, Genoa, makes a breakthrough.
The pupo he started to cover with armors of worked metal enriched by engravings, starts and arabesques and the technical shrewdness they were done sought after more and more: the thread that the right hand of the pupo commanded was replaced from an iron auction, so that the oprante could make to complete to the pupo, you operate more precise as to extract and to put back the sword in the sheath, to embrace a dame, to fight the breast or the forehead with the fist, to lower the visor of the helmet and contemporarily suits, mantles and skirts were sewn with beautiful and precious cloths more and more.
In Sicily, the theater of the marionettes assumes an unique characterization, both for the contents and for the technique, that he/she takes the name of "the opra of the pupis." The repertoire, generally in Sicilian dialect, it primarily recalls him the stories of Hemming and of the paladins of France.
For centuries the Sicilian pupis, cleverly animated by generations of "Pupari", you/they have constituted the only source of education and one of the few occasions of relaxation and fun for the humblest classes in a first time, and pursued also appreciated by the middle class.
The work of the pupi
Historically the Opera of the Pupis is born as representation of the medieval clashes between the Riders and the Moors, in the form in which we know her/it today, around the second halves 1800, when the chivalrous marionettes, from which the Pupis derive met the favor of the public and they began to interpret the feelings and the aspirations of justice of a social class.
The diffusion of such form artistic expression, was mainly favorite from the "Cantastorie" and from the "Cuntastorie." The one, artist-vagabond, treats the epic theme through the song, the recitation and the mimicry, while the "Cuntastorie" you/he/she performs the same themes through the declamation being a narrator that doesn't use any musical tool, but you/he/she uses to modulate the voice with a technique all particular, that is handed down of generation in generation.
In the Opera of the Pupis the transmission of tall codes of behavior is had by the ancient origins that have interested the Sicilian people, codes as the cavalry, the sense of the honor, the struggle for the justice and the faith, the loving interlacements and the greed to excel. Such theatrical form, also in his/her simplicity, you/he/she has allowed in a certain sense the popularization of the epic.
The Pupari
The Puparo is the artist-artisan true fulcrum of the Opra of the Pupis. To his/her dependences they work at least two assistant-apprentices and it asked for the collaboration of the blacksmith-blacksmith (for the realization of the armors of the pupis) of the painter (for the realization of the placards and for the decoration of the theater) and of the writer of dispensations (from which to draw the scripts). The components of the family often help the puparo in the carrying out of his "work", what in the time you/he/she is had to also make load of said competences.
Every puparo has its makeups and stage techniques and his/her own thick repertoire personalized of which it is very jealous and that it reveals to its assistants, even if belonging to its family, the later possible. Being a good puparo doesn't mean only to be a good artisan, but also to be a good actor considering that he has the assignment to animate the pupis and to give them the voice.
|
|
