How do we experience loss? How can we hold and appreciate what has been left to us? Puno: Letters from the Sky is a story of Tala, a young girl who is coping with her father’s passing and learning about life and death. 

“Words can often fail. With its universal touchstones and emotional, beautiful articulation, Puno and Tala's story of separation and grief ultimately joins every human being in a shared space of love, memory, and longing.”  - Geleran.id 

Papermoon Puppet Theatre was founded in 2006 by illustrator, writer, and theatre performer Maria (Ria) Tri Sulistyani and visual artist Iwan Effendi. Based in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, in a country with world-renowned puppetry traditions, the expert artists of Papermoon Puppet Theatre extend this form with their mixed-media productions that tell stories about the choices, values, circumstances, and conflicts of everyday life. “Our stories are personal and focus on individuals. From there we can see the bigger issues.” - Ria Sulistyani 

Since their U.S. debut with Center Stage in 2012, Papermoon has shared their work around the globe, created a residency compound in Yogyakarta to host collaborating and visiting artists, and continued to produce Pesta Boneka, a community-based festival for international puppet makers, started in 2008.

Puno: Letters to the Sky

50-minute non-verbal puppet performance and art installation
For children and adults; age 7+  
Available September 1-October 13, 2025
Half-week and week-long residencies only 

Puppetry and Visual Arts workshops for students (elementary – college) and professionals
College and university classroom visits
No student-only performances
Contextual and thematic educational materials will be available winter 2025.

Travelers

11 on tour: Cast of 5

Venues

Black box or intimate proscenium stages seating 100-500 people (steep audience rake required). Optimal play space: 20’ wide x 20’ deep and 20’ to lighting batten. Black marley, soft goods to enclose the performance space required. Audio playback.

• Link to Papermoon Puppet Theatre's Technical Rider
• Link to Puno (Letters to the Sky) Booklet

Photos

▸Access to downloadable high resolution photos here. 

World Culture in Context

A package of virtual educational materials, tailored to students in upper elementary through high school will provide a better understanding of the context in which these artists thrive. Available Spring 2025. Visit www.worldcultureincontext.org

Billing & Credit

Shortest billing for event listings, etc.

papermoon puppet theatre
on tour as part of Center Stage

The following credit is required on the title page in all printed performance programs. We appreciate its use wherever else it's practical: brochures, posters, ensemble-only promotional materials, press releases, advertisements, etc:

Papermoon Puppet Theatre is on tour in the USA as part of Center Stage, an initiative of the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs with funding provided by the U.S. Government. It is administered by the New England Foundation for the Arts in cooperation with the U.S. Regional Arts Organizations. General management is provided by Lisa Booth Management, Inc. www.centerstageUS.org. 

Center Stage logo placement is greatly appreciated. On web-based materials, please link from the Center Stage logo or written name to www.centerstageUS.org. 

Download the Center Stage Logo (various formats) here.

About papermoon

Papermoon Puppet Theatre was founded in April 2006 in Yogyakarta, Indonesia by Co-Artistic Director Maria “Ria” Tri Sulistyani. She has since nurtured, developed, and expanded the company together with Co-Artistic Director Iwan Effendi, a visual artist and Papermoon’s puppet designer. Among other close collaborators, we work with a collective of puppeteers. 

To date, Papermoon Puppet Theatre has created more than 30 puppet productions, visual art installations, and exhibitions, which we have toured to a dozen countries. In 2008, we launched Pesta Boneka, an international puppet biennale that welcomes puppeteers from around the world to our home city, where they can share their work in a community setting.

Papermoon Puppet Theatre believes that anything can come alive. Every creature, every object, every single thing in the world holds life somewhere inside of it. With our performances, installations, workshops, collaborations, and festival, we hope to bring those things to life—through the amazing art form of puppetry, as well as by nurturing the good things around and within us.

Papermoon Puppet Theatre:

• creates original puppet performances on contemporary themes
• makes visual art installations and exhibitions
• engages in collaborative and interdisciplinary projects
• offers workshops and talks for all ages on puppetry and performance making
• produces Pesta Boneka, our international puppet biennale

Papermoon has shared work with audiences around the world, from Japan to The Netherlands, from Australia, and Pakistan to the United States. But our home and our hearts are always in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, where we are lucky enough to be part of a vibrant arts community. 

2012 program notes

On tour as part of Center Stage in Mwathirika

Maria Tri Sulistyani, Director 
Iwan Effendi, Artistic Designer and Puppet Engineer 
Octo Cornelius, Artistic Engineer 
Anton Fajri & Beni Sanjaya, Puppet and Set Construction 
Yennu Ariendra, Music Director and Sound Designer 
Banjar Tri Andaru, Lighting Designer 
Doni Maulistya, Video Artist 
Gemailla Gea Geriantiana…. Costume Designer 
Retno Intiani, Costume Designer

Puppeteers 
Amanda Mita, Maria Tri Sulistyani, Anton Fajri, Beni Sanjaya, Octo Cornelius, Iwan Effendi

Indonesia Production 
Wulang Sunu, Suryo Hapsoro

Mwathirika was made possible with an Empowering Woman Artist 2010-2011 grant, supported by Kelola Foundation/Yayasan Kelola (Jakarta), HIVOS and FORD Foundation.

About the Company

In a country renowned for its puppetry traditions, Papermoon Puppet Theatre is a young, contemporary standout. The company was founded in 2006 by Maria Tri Sulistyani (an illustrator, writer, and former actor) and is now co-directed by Iwan Effendi (a visual artist who likes to tell stories). Based in Yogyakarta, Java, Papermoon draws on a variety of Indonesian and other performing arts forms and techniques to create its mixed-media works. Not content to create productions for the theatrical stage, Papermoon also stages site-specific performances in markets, trains, town squares, art galleries, and other public spaces. It launched an antique and found objects shop in Jogja earlier this year. It regularly holds puppetry workshops for and with artists, community groups, adults and children. 

Papermoon Puppet Theatre is making its U,S. debut with Mwathirika under the auspices of Center Stage, a cultural exchange and public diplomacy program initiated by the U.S. Department of State. From September 4 – October 2, 2012, the company is participating in residencies, exchange activities and presenting performances in Washington DC, Easton PA, Huntingdon PA, Lewisburg PA, West Liberty IA, Providence RI and New York City.

About Mwathirika

The 1965 attempted coup against Indonesian leader, Sukarno, and the turbulent aftermath when thousands of Indonesians were jailed and murdered, was made famous by Christopher Koch’s book The Year of Living Dangerously and the Peter Weir film of the same name. With Mwathirika, Papermoon’s multi-media puppet play seeks the emotional truth behind the public events -- to recover the personal stories of those lost, and to recall the lost history of their nation.
Mwathirika (which means 'victim' in Swahili) is set in a specific time and place, but its undercurrent is the mass violence that was perpetrated, experienced, and witnessed around the globe throughout the 20th century.

“Though our work is based on family stories, the things that these stories are about have happened around the world,” reflects Papermoon’s artistic co-director and founder Maria Tri Sulistyani. “We want to share ‘Mwathirika’ with Americans because we want all of us to understand, so it will never happen again. Anywhere in the world.”

The production flowed from Papermoon’s co-director Iwan Effendi’s longtime interest in Indonesia during the mid-1960s, when anti-communist agitation under then President Sukarno led to murder, prison, and broken families for millions of Indonesians. Effendi’s grandfather was imprisoned for thirteen years without trial. Though general historical accounts address this period through dates and numbers, few people discussed their harrowing personal experiences in the immediate aftermath of the atrocities. Personal memoirs began to be published in the late 1990s, but discussions of the tragedy -- at home, in schools, in communities, and among artists and intellectuals are still often isolated, rare occurrences.