Puppet Theater Mostar

The Mostar Puppet Theater performed its first show "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" back in 1952 as the City Puppet Theater Mostar.

That was the first bud, the first flower, of mostarkoglutkarstva. And the roots of puppetry go back even further. Namely, the first puppet shows appeared in Mostar in the middle of the 19th century, when traveling troupes from Central Europe, Vojvodina, Croatia and the Orient performed dramatic and then puppet shows.

The first puppet show was Karadžoz. Mostar immediately embraced and loved the art of puppetry. Thus, already in 1939, near Sokolska župa, a puppet theater was established in which Đorđe Bovan was the actor, director and organizer. War and destruction come to Žalost, which suppressed but did not destroy the beautiful word, culture, puppetry and art in general. This is how Mostar, by decision of the People's Committee of the City of Mostar, established the City Puppet Theatre, the first professional institution of stage musical culture for the children of Mostar and Herzegovina. Mostar and the city began to live the dream of puppetry again.

It was Đorđe Bovan who was appointed as the first manager of the theater exactly 70 years ago as a director, staging the first play "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" and thus begins the famous history of the Puppet Theater Mostar.

From those moments, the puppetry of Mostar grew with easy and uncertain steps, just like the first steps of the famous Pinocchio, and paved the way for the world fame of this theater.
In later years, precisely in 1960, the theater changed its name to Mostar Puppet Theater, but still continued its successful work and journey to stardom.

Until 1967, marionette shows were performed, and from that year hand puppets and all other puppetry techniques were introduced.
Like all other theaters, ours had its ups and downs and overcame all children's diseases, grew and grew, and in the second half of the 1980s it reached international fame.

The plays Asagao directed by Todor Ristć and the play Zlatorog directed by Edia Majaron should be mentioned here, which was awarded as the best play at the 5th Biennale in Bugojno.
With many international awards and a performance at the UNIMA World Congress in Ljubljana in 1988, she entered the world encyclopedia of puppetry.

Unfortunately, difficult and tumorous years are coming, years of suffering and suffering, years of war. But like many times in history when states, empires and kingdoms disappeared in wars, culture defied. The beautiful warm and noble words of art surpassed the destructiveness of war.

So in 1992, all the actors and workers who remained in Mostar understood their historical and cultural task.
In the same year, they went on a tour along the paths of exiled and refugee children from Mostar, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia, performing in all the cities, municipalities and places where exiled and refugee children were.

That's why the tour was called "Paths of Runaway and Exiled Children". In the war year 1993, the puppet theater changed its name to Mostar Puppet Theater. Despite the war and destruction, the puppeteers set out to create new values of new plays with great heart and enthusiasm.

In the hope that we will illuminate the gloomy everyday life of children in extremely difficult times. In 1993, the first post-war play "Grajko and Čupavko" was created, directed by Luka Paljetka.
The continuous work of this theater defied all the adversities and follies of that time, fostering art, nobility and morality for future generations.

The fact that from 1992 to 1995, a total of 418 performances were performed and two premieres were made, also speaks of the infatuation and infatuation of the Mostar Puppet Theater with art.

After all the difficult times of war and war, we still create new plays with the same passion and zeal, "Tigrić", "Karius and Baktus", "Striborov's Forest", "Dragon and Princesses" and numerous others recognized at many international festivals. We understand our role in society, teaching the youngest, through our plays, responsibilities, morals, good behavior, and everything that will help them grow into creative and exemplary citizens.