Czech Republic · Puppet making; Wood craft; Czech heritage
České Loutky — Pražská Marionetová Tradice
The Czech marionette making tradition — the production of the distinctive Czech string puppet (marioneta) that has been the defining form of Czech popular theater from the 17th century to the present, and whose specific Czech character vocabulary (the philosophical clown, the everyday Czech man, the doctor) has created the most internationally recognized national puppet tradition in the world. The Czech loutkář reads the correct puppet head carving quality through a tilt-and-expression assessment — tilting the carved head at multiple angles and reading the specific expression change that indicates the head geometry produces correct multiple emotional readings.
Risk level: Stable · Czech puppetry arts UNESCO ICH 2016
The making of chandeliers from hand-blown, hand-cut lead crystal components mounted on a metal frame, as practiced in North Bohemia's Crystal Valley (Kamenický Šenov and Nový Bor).
The Šumava (Bohemian Forest) painted glass tradition — the making of reverse glass paintings (Hinterglasmalerei) that decorated the walls of Bohemian forest farmhouses from the 17th century with religious and folk scenes painted on the…
The Czech tin toy making tradition — the production of the specific Bohemian pressed-tin and lithographed-tin toys that from the 19th century made the Czech lands (together with Nuremberg and Saxony) one of the primary toy-producing…
The Bohemian garnet cutting tradition of Turnov — the production of the distinctive Czech pyrope garnet jewelry whose specific deep red-violet color (the rarest and most valuable variety of garnet) has been cut in the Turnov region since…
The Vamberk needle lace tradition of East Bohemia — the distinctive Czech fine lace making tradition centered on the town of Vamberk (krajkářské město — 'lace city'), which from the 17th century developed a specific needle lace vocabulary…
The Slovácká embroidery tradition of South Moravia — the distinctive Moravian folk embroidery of the Slovácko ethnographic region whose characteristic densely packed floral and geometric cross stitch on white linen is one of the most…
The making of traditional Uzbek theatrical puppets — glove puppets (qol qoghirchoq), string marionettes (ip qoghirchoq), and puppets of varying scale (mayda qoghirchoq, small; katta qoghirchoq, large) — for a puppet theater tradition…
The Salzburg marionette making tradition of the Salzburger Marionettentheater — the construction and stringing of the specific performance marionettes used by the Salzburg Marionette Theatre (established 1913), whose characteristic…
The making of the batoola, a traditional rigid face mask historically worn by women across the Persian Gulf, including Qatar, the UAE, Bahrain, Oman, and Kuwait, as well as by Bandari Persian communities in southern Iran.
Bunraku (文楽) is Japan's traditional puppet theater — UNESCO inscribed in 2003 — using puppets operated by three visible puppeteers per puppet: the omozukai (主遣い) operates the head and right hand, the hidarizukai (左遣い) operates the left…
The Prajapati caste of Thimi (near Bhaktapur) produces Nepal's primary terracotta festival masks for Indra Jatra using press-molding into carved wooden molds — a Nau-Prajapati inter-caste collaboration (Nau carvers the mold, Prajapati…
Noh-men (能面) are the carved and painted wooden masks of Japan's Noh theater — one of the world's great mask traditions and, uniquely, a tradition where the mask controls the performer rather than the reverse: the subtle angle of the Noh…