Awakening the Earth

I am at Embercombe, a very special green valley in the Haldon Forest, near Exeter, Devon. I have the honour to be able to say that at present, my professional role is to wake up under canvas in this green valley, and spend the day moulding cardboard and cornflour paste into mythic beings which will open and close the 2012 Westcountry Storytelling Festival, beginning next weekend. Amongst these beings are the two giants, Gog and Magog, a green man with a body of tree bark and a human sized corn dolly. As I wring water out pieces of cardboard and slather them with cornflour paste, I think of Peter Schumann and the Bread and Puppet Theater in Vermont, USA, where I learnt these brilliant giant puppet sculpting techniques three summers ago.