UConn's Master Puppeteer Gets Major International Distinction

STORRS, CT — The University of Connecticut's meter puppeteer has received some major international recognition that puts his creations on par with the likes of the Muppets.

UConn officials Monday announced that the leading international puppetry organization has recognized Bart Roccoberton Jr., head of UConn’s renowned Puppet Arts program, for his decades of teaching and promoting puppetry around the world.

Roccoberton received a Special Citation as "North America's Chancellor of Puppetry Education and Training for the Twenty-First Century" from the United States chapter of the Union Internationale de la Marionnette, known as UNIMA, the global puppetry organization based in France and affiliated with the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. or UNESCO.

Roccoberton joins a group of only 12 Special Citation recipients that includes Jim Henson, best known for the Muppets and Sesame Street; and Albrecht Roser, a leading German puppeteer and teacher of puppetry arts recognized as a pioneer in establishing puppetry as an art form internationally.

The citation says Roccoberton "has served the field of puppetry with indefatigable energy, perseverance, skilled leadership and exquisite craftsmanship… espousing an international perspective with an openness and love for all forms of puppetry…developing new audiences for puppetry."

The choice of the word chancellor was to show his bridge of education and for building the careers of puppeteers in the U.S. and beyond, said Kathy Foley, president of UNIMA-USA’s board of directors.

“Bart did a lot of international work that put American puppetry in places it had not been before," Foley said. "The Special Citation category is for people who over a long period of time have been contributing both artistically, in service, and usually in representation of what American puppetry is about to the wider world."

Roccoberton first traveled to China in 1994 as part of a U.S. Information Service cultural tour that ultimately led Chinese puppeteers to join UNIMA and host the organization’s 2012 international puppetry festival.

"Bart has always had an international perspective on puppetry," says Andrew Periale, editor of UNIMA’s Puppetry International Magazine and a former member of Roccoberton’s Pandemonium Puppets troupe. "Bart has had, and continues to have, an impact on the lives and careers of hundreds of aspiring puppeteers."

Added Vincent Anthony, founder of the Center for Puppetry Arts in Atlanta and general secretary for UNIMA-USA, "Bart has been the guiding light of our scholarship program. This has been very instrumental in allowing puppeteers to gain much needed knowledge from top teachers for years. He single-handedly recruited the China puppeteers to join as a group, creating the Chinese UNIMA Center. This opened a floodgate of Asian countries to join UNIMA."

UConn is the only university in the United States offering a bachelor’s degree and two master’s degrees, MA or MFA, in puppetry. Alumni from the Puppet Arts Program build for and manage internationally recognized television programs and films, write books, design toys, teach children, and direct prominent schools and museums.

They also have worked in television and stage productions such as "Sesame Street" and "Crash and Bernstein" and "Lion King" and "Avenue Q," and "Little Shop of Horrors" and "Frozen on Ice."

In 2016, UConn puppeteers created six original works and built 40 puppets to perform with the Boston Pops Orchestra, featuring a puppet of legendary conductor Arthur Fiedler.