Tryon Fine Arts Center presents the Cashore Marionettes Life In Motion on Saturday, Nov. 2 at 8 p.m.

The Center for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta says of Joseph Cashore’s award winning production, “ A wonderful world of breath-taking magic is created by one man and his exquisite marionettes.”

Hailed by the Calgary Herald as “a simple but brilliant production,” Life in Motion consists of a series of puppet vignettes conveying universal themes of life. Audience members are moved by the “humor, sadness, pathos, love and joy” communicated through the hand-built marionettes accompanied by carefully chosen, beautiful music.

At the age of 11, Joseph Cashore created his first marionette from clothespins, wood, string and a tin can. It was while playing with this puppet that he was startled by the sudden but momentary sensation that the puppet was alive.

After graduation from college, Cashore made his second marionette. He remembered that first marionette from childhood and thought he would try to make a puppet that could sustain and extend that sensation of being alive. For the next nineteen years, while pursuing a career in oil painting, he experimented with the construction of the marionettes and devised totally new control mechanisms.

Cashore says, “…Once I began to solve the technical problems and gain subtle control of the Marionette body, I saw that there was the possibility for greater depth of expression with the Marionettes.”

Cashore has toured the US, Europe and Asia with his creations since the 1990s. As a result of Cashore’s mastery of this expressive movement, he has received numerous awards including a Pew Charitable Trusts’ Fellowship for Performance Art, based upon his artistic accomplishment. He has also received a Henson Foundation Grant; an award intended to help promote puppetry to adult audiences.

He has been awarded the highest honor an American puppeteer can receive, a Citation of Excellence from UNIMA, Union Internationale de la Marionette, the world’s oldest theatre organization. UNIMA states that Citations are “awarded to shows that touch their audiences deeply; that totally engage, enchant and enthrall.”

The evening production is intended for adults or young people over 12 years of age. There will be an additional program by Cashore Marionettes titled Simple Gifts, designed for families with children 12 and under. This presentation will be from 2-3 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 2. Specially priced tickets are available for families for this presentation online or at the box office.

Cashore Marionettes’ Life in Motion, sponsored by the Kirby Endowment fund at Polk County Community Foundation, is the second in Tryon Fine Arts Center’s Main Stage Season sponsored by Millard and Company. Tickets are available online at www.tryonarts.org or by calling 828-859-8322.