Kris Fleerackers

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Kris Fleerackers is a Flemish-Canadian puppetry artist and filmmaker with a background in theatre, teaching, and television production. He writes, designs, creates music for, and performs in his own shows, and has been building puppets since he was a young boy.

Puppet creations include an award-winning short film, a puppet version of Henry Purcell’s baroque opera “Dido and Aeneas,” live shows for all ages, a ‘flash performance’ for French CBC, a new puppet play written with Canada Council support, as well as short pieces and videos for the web.

Kris has worked as a theatre director, actor, dramaturg, writer and educator; he has performed with The Bread and Puppet Theatre as well as theatre companies in Belgium and France. He has taught theatre and puppetry workshops, built and animated puppets for community events, and created puppets, props, sets and costumes for the stage as well as for television. His media experience includes 14 years as a producer-director and award-winning production editor at CBC/Radio-Canada.

He holds an MA in Performance Studies from New York University and an MA in Literature, Linguistics and Theatre Studies from Antwerp University. Puppetry training includes intensives at Humber College and The Banff Centre as well as workshops in puppetry, mask, clowning, shadow theatre, playwriting, Early Music, sword fighting, and dance.