The Ballard Institute and the UConn Puppet Arts Program Will Host the 2025 UConn Fall Puppet Slam

The Ballard Institute and Museum of Puppetry and the UConn Puppet Arts Program will present the 2025 UConn Fall Puppet Slam on Friday, Oct. 24, 2025 at 8 p.m. in UConn’s Nafe Katter Theatre, located at 820 Bolton Rd, Storrs, Conn. 06269. The UConn Fall Puppet Slam will feature experimental short works by professional puppeteers and performers, including UConn Puppet Arts alumni Mark Blashford, Sarah Frechette, and Anatar M. Gagné, as well as new works by UConn Puppet Arts students. Mansfield’s Waldron’s Studio 88 will return once more as the Puppet Slam house band.

In celebration of the 60th anniversary of the UConn Puppet Arts Program, the 2025 UConn Fall Puppet Slam will welcome back three Puppet Arts alumni: Mark Blashford, Sarah Frechette, and Anatar Marmol Gagné. Mark Blashford will perform Home, in which a string puppet paints, from his heart, the place he longs to be. In Out of the Darkness, Sarah Frechette embeds deep emotion into a hand-carved figure and sorrowful silhouettes in a moving portrait of sensitivity, grief and grace. Anatar M. Gagné’s Widow Bunny started as a photographic documentation of her grieving process after the unexpected loss of her husband last year. She has now transformed it into a puppet production and will premiere an excerpt at the slam. The UConn Fall Puppet Slam also features new works by graduate and undergraduate students from the UConn Puppet Arts Program. Funding for the slam is made possible, in part, by the Puppet Slam Network. These performances are recommended for mature audiences. Learn more at bimp.uconn.edu/2025/10/08/2025-fall-slam/.

The UConn Fall Puppet Slam is free and open to the public; donations are greatly appreciated. Seating is limited and is on a first-come, first-served basis. Doors open at 7:30 p.m. The event will take place in UConn’s Nafe Katter Theatre, located at 820 Bolton Rd, Storrs, Conn. 06269 (directions here). For more information about these performances or if you require accommodation to attend this event, please contact Ballard Institute staff at 860-486-8580 or bimp@uconn.edu.