Puppets and Muppets in Atlanta

If I've said it once, I've said it a thousand times: you can spend all the time you want reading travel guides, but the best way to find something truly amazing in a new city is to just wander. Nine times out of ten, you will stumble across something you never would've dreamed of finding, frequently something very few people actually visit. This is how I found the Center for the Puppetry Arts (http://www.puppet.org/).

Returning to Atlanta to visit again ten years after spending a summer there doing research at Georgia Tech, I was driving up and down the same old streets in Midtown, when I spotted a sign for the Center. Really, it was the mention of Jim Henson that drew me in. I didn't pull over, but looked it up as soon as I got back to the hotel. I knew this would be my jackpot attraction this trip.

Once you've done Atlanta's main attractions (Georgia Aquarium, World of Coke), and sampled the plethora of amazing restaurants and rooftop bars, one sometimes wonders what ELSE there is to do in this town. Even though it is quite tiny, the collection at the Center for Puppetry Arts is an incredible stop to make, for both adults and for children.

The museum visit begins at a seemingly harmless steel drum behind a fence, with a marked button that begs to be pressed. The ominous warning "May frighten small children" makes it all the more enticing. The button engages the piece's mechanics, and the barrel transforms into a quite amazing Phoenix, the symbol of the city of Atlanta. It truly is a tad frightening. It properly sets the tone of beauty, wonder, and uneasiness (even, dare I say, terror) that guides the rest of the exhibits.

The following rooms are a mix of history and nostalgia,

artful and obscure,

with puppets from several time periods, and displays focused on puppetry in different cultures (Asian shadow puppetry, Punch & Judy, African artifacts).

There's even a "Naughty Room" for adults only, featuring slightly raunchy audio and video from Madame, as well as the puppet itself.

While I appreciate the history and cultural significance of puppetry, and was fascinated by all the examples in the collection, what excited me most were the Jim Henson pieces. Unfortunately, the museum is arranged such that the first piece of his you encounter is the most terrifying of all, one of the Skeksis from "The Dark Crystal." Personally, I still have nightmares about that movie, and I haven't seen it since I was 8.

After I regain composure and start breathing again, I discover the many other examples of Henson's work that make me feel warm and fuzzy inside. Labyrinth,

Fraggle Rock,

Sesame Street,

The Muppet Show.

I remember exactly where I was when I found out Jim Henson had died. We were on my school's week-long Fifth Grade Trip to Washington, D.C. For some reason, dinner this night was at the Food Court of some downtown shopping mall in Crystal City. As it was losing popularity even then, we were pretty much the only people around. Reporters from local papers spotted children, and starting asking us how we felt about the news that day. Still not really comprehending "death," it didn't really hit me until later. But I knew what the Muppets had meant to me growing up, and it truly was a sad day.

Walking past the Henson examples brought me back to that day. And made me pleasantly nostalgic for how the Muppets changed the world. The Center had accomplished its goal with me. Visiting made me see and truly, deeply comprehend what a powerful effect Puppetry has had on the world today, how varied it can be, how essential it is to the culture. And how the arts, not just puppets, can have such an emotional hold on everyone.