Frank Soehnle

Frank Soehnle, born in Stuttgart in 1963, is a German puppeteer, puppet maker, director and visual-theatre performer who has spent over three decades developing the string marionette into a contemporary performance instrument. He studied figure theatre at the State University of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart from 1983 to 1987, where the curriculum's marionette lineage was closely associated with Albrecht Roser, whom Soehnle encountered as a teenager and later acknowledged as a mentor. This training integrated construction, manipulation and stage composition into a single practice rather than treating the puppet as an object added after direction.

After graduating, Soehnle directed Karlsruhe's marotte puppet theatre from 1987 to 1990. In 1989 he began a long collaboration with the music group rat'n'X, establishing a working method in which sound functions as a rhythmic partner to the figures' weight, suspension and transformation. In 1991, Soehnle and Karin Ersching founded the independent touring company figuren theater tübingen. That year's solo *Nachtgesichter* inaugurated what the company calls "visual poems" at the threshold of visual and performing art. *Flamingo Bar* followed in 1996, with Soehnle's figures and performance, Hendrik Mannes's direction, rat'n'X's music and Ersching's lighting. The production toured internationally and helped establish the company's adult, image-driven theatre language.

The repertoire expanded into political, literary and cross-disciplinary work. *Kinder der Bestie* (2000), based on David Grossman and performed by Soehnle with actor Yehuda Almagor, placed material and puppet dramaturgy in a political context. *liquid skin* (2005) paired Soehnle's puppetry with James Cunningham's choreography and dance in an IGNEOUS collaboration under Suzon Fuks's direction and video design. *salto.lamento* (2006), a solo work with music by Stefan Mertin and Johannes Frisch and choreography by Karin Ould Chih, returned to a concentrated frame.

Soehnle's treatment of the visible relationship between puppet and manipulator has become central to his practice. In 2011's *Hôtel de Rive*, inspired by Alberto Giacometti, he performed alongside actor Patrick Michaëlis with live music. In 2013 he joined fellow Roser students Alice Therese Gottschalk and Raphael Mürle for *Wunderkammer*, choreographed by Lisa Thomas; the production received the Jury's Prize at the International Festival of Puppetry Art in Bielsko-Biała in 2014.

Recent work has continued to revisit puppetry's inheritance and new collaborative structures. *Das 2te Ich* premiered in 2018, and Munich's Stadtmuseum mounted an exhibition of Soehnle's figures that year. *strings up!* (2019) restored and reactivated marionettes by Fritz Herbert Bross; *_night.flowers* (2022) paired Soehnle's figures with Søren Gundermann's piano; and *kafkabagage* (2024) translated Kafka fragments into an alternating-cast visual score. Alongside performance and direction, Soehnle has taught at institutions in Stuttgart, Berlin, Bochum, Charleville-Mézières, Jerusalem and Tours.