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What are marottes?
Marottes are really an unofficial term, applicable to a type of rod puppet. These puppets are operated from below, either with the puppeteer visible and/or sitting on the floor, or with the puppeteer hidden by a ‘flat’ (theatre term for false wall). This is unlike table-top puppetry, where the usual performance style is to work from behind the puppet, holding the rods at right angles to the puppeteer’s body. A very easy way to imagine a marotte is the jester’s stick, the one with the little jester head at the top of a stick. Example video at the bottom of the post.
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What are shoulder puppets?
Technically speaking, this isn’t so much a type of puppet, but a particular brand of puppet. That is, someone has built a puppet a certain way, and has made it so well-known the name they gave it has become well-known amongst the public. (Much like how a "muppet" isn’t really a type of puppet, just a name someone gave to their style of puppetry) I first heard about shoulder puppets via Puppets and Stuff. So what are they?
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What is wayang golek?
Wayang golek is the name given to Indonesian rod puppets (not to be confused with wayang kulit), and is also often known as Javanese puppetry. Java being an island within Indonesia. Wayang means ‘puppet’ - which is why it is often confused with wayang kulit. Wayang golek is distinctive due to its particular character designs: angular shoulders; long, skinny arms and legs; and extremely elaborate carvings, paintwork and costumes. Excellent video can be found at the bottom of this post.
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What are rod puppets?
A rod puppet can include a range of things, but generally speaking, it is inclusive of any puppet that uses rods as the sole mechanism for operation. Rod puppets can include other puppet types, like muppet-type puppets, marottes, and the Japanese art of bunraku, or the more bastardised Western version of bunraku, known as table-top puppetry.
That's actually quite a timely post. Although it's winter in Melbourne, it's summer here in the United States, and it's hot, hot, hot. But at least where I live is pretty dry, so it's somewhat harder for fungus to grow (doesn't mean that they don't, just not as much).
... Kelvin Kao on How to protect puppets from sweaty hands