Eyes On Stalks [Paperback]

Welfare State International are brilliant at making an audience of strangers into a community Guardian

Welfare State International, the inspirational theatre company founded in 1968 and based in Cumbria, creates and facilitates celebratory art and theatre, ranging from carnivals, lantern processions and rites of passage, to flags, banners and pyrotechnics. In a mixture of personal stories, clear instructions, poems and artists' sketches, Eyes on Stalks is a detailed and practical guide to their production techniques. It includes sections on caravans and street shows, community regeneration, comedy extravaganzas and alternative naming, betrothal and funeral ceremonies.

John Fox made puppets as a child, learned about explosives in the National Service, spent his PPE co urse at Oxford doing life-drawing at The Ruskin School, then studied Fine Art at Newcastle. He formed Welfare State with Sue Gill and others in 1968, and continues to be their Artistic Director and Chief Executive.