The new project, from the team behind the Syrian refugee puppet Little Amal which traversed the globe, aims to raise awareness about climate change. In April 2025, a herd of animals will travel from the Congo Basin in Central Africa to the northern tip of Norway - drawing attention to climate change. Forced out of their natural habitats due to global warming, they will be displaced and traversed through cities and urban environments to meet the people there.
But they won't be real animals - they are puppets, made from recycled materials. This project comes from the team behind "The Walk" in 2021, where a giant 12-foot puppet of a refugee girl named traveled through 15 countries, including Turkey, the UK, Ukraine, Mexico, and the US, highlighting the . "The Herds" will be a much bigger and more complicated project.
Along the route, animals native to the countries they are traveling through will join the group, meaning that by the time they get to Norway, they will have assembled around 150 animal puppets. "Through theatre, we can engage with the major issues of the day. We’re looking particularly for a way in which this very, central event in our lives, climate change, can be expressed not in scientific terms," David Lan, one of the producers behind The Herds, tells Euronews Culture.
He adds: "What we think we might be able to do is allow people to engage emotionally with what is already happening all over Amir Nizar Zuabi, the artistic director of the project, who also work.
