Karin Andrews Jashapara - artistic director

Training:  BA English at University College London, PGCE (Institute of Education, London), Masters' research into Shakespeare and Metaphor, (The Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham); Shadow theatre making and performing, (Gulbenkian Foundation Bursary 1993-4), FSL Forest School Leader (Go Wild Education 2019), Storytelling developed with Surrey Storytellers, 2015 - 20). Fully insured, First Aid trained and DBS updated. 

Forest School Leader and maker/writer/performer

Forest School Leader - Birdhurst Nursery, South Croydon - October 2023 - present

Forest School Leader - The London Acorn School 2018 - April 2024

Little Acorns parent - child group leader 2018 - 2023

Storyteller, with shadow / 2D imagery, 2012 - present

COMMISSIONS

Scrappetto (on recycling, repairing and re-using materials and things) for touring schools in the London Borough of Sutton 1987

Croaky Flies Again (on recognising the effects of acid rain) for touring schools in the LBS 1992

Shadows of Dreamtime (environmental attitudes learned from indigenous people of Arnhem Land) for  special events in LBS  1995

'Blue Like an Apple' (exploring and debating the human causes of climate change) for DEFRA and the London Borough of Sutton, to tour schools from 2008 

'Death in a Nut' (Duncan Williamson's version of a Scottish folktale transcribed by Linda Williamson) for Kicking the Bucket Festival, 2014  

'Where Are You Now?' (the effect on family members of catastrophic brain damage) for CDOC Research Centre, Universities of Cardiff and York, 2015

The Name of the Tree - a Tanzanian story told with shadow puppets for 3 - 6 year-olds for The London Acorn School, 2023

The Three Treasure Chests - a shadow theatre play adapted from Margaret Peckham's Nature Stories (1982) for The London Acorn School, 2024.

Freelance apprenticeships and highlights :

English National Opera : puppeteer for Blond Eckbert by Judith Weir

Mme Souhami & Co : puppeteer and workshop leader

Horse + Bamboo : costume and puppet designer and maker, workshop leader

Rhythm Tree Theatre - several  commissioned puppetry works for young people, exploring diverse environmental issues 1986 - 2008

Rhythm Tree Theatre designed and performed adaptation of  Margaret Mahy's The Man Whose Mother Was a Pirate 1994

Adapted and Performed  (glove, rod and shadow puppets, piano accordion, clarinet) with Sarha Moore (Saxophone, oboe, percussion )

Peppercorn Puppets  touring nationally 1983 - 5

Tricorn Puppets; apprenticed to Kinny Gardner and Erika Cruttwell as glove and rod puppeteer 

Colleagues in Play of Light  : 

Elizabeth Andrews  - Freelance cellist and director of music projects, formerly CEO of The Scottish Ensemble

Will Embliss - musician, composer, instrument designer and maker

Zannie Fraser - director of 'Blue Like an Apple' 2007 also puppeteer and writer, director of Ripstop Theatre

Rachael Nicholson -  director of 'Death in a Nut' 2014, also art therapist, puppeteer and writer

Ben Musgrave - writer leading workshops for The Conference of the Birds and The Invisible Man

Awards, additional Commissions and Bursaries 

2016  Cultural Award    Legacy of the Olympic and Paralympic Forum 2012 , awarded by the London Borough of Sutton

2016 Commissioned by the Arts Council -funded  Sutton Imagine Arts Festival to create a version of The Invisible Man, with students from two High Schools.

2013  Imagine Arts Festival - extracts from The Story of Lieutenant Cockatoo by Phyllis Tate and Ronald Eyre

2012  Big Dance funded project : Wandle Valley pupils making and dancing with masks in Sutton Ecology Centre

2012 Arts Council of England commission working with Ben Musgrave and several local artists on script - writing, shadow puppetry, collage, print-making : a participatory arts project in the community : The Conference of the Birds by Farid Ud-Din Attar, managed, delivered and performed in the London Borough of Sutton