Cave Dogs brings together visual artists, musicians, puppeteers, dancers, storytellers and writers in the spirit of experimental interdisciplinary collaboration. Our performances consist of innovative, large-scale shadow projections cast onto a screen from props, puppets and the human body. Cast shadows move in concert with projected video imagery, spoken narrative, and an original soundtrack. High intensity, hand held lights create dynamic, unusual and distorted shadows of varying scale onto a translucent scrim. Working with a variety of artistic mediums, Cave Dogs creates multiple, richly layered visual tableaus, and produce effects that conjure both the dreamlike quality of early experimental film and the humor of contemporary animation. The text, visuals, and sound track of Cave Dogs performances together make up a substantial artifact that documents, preserves and celebrates important cultural voices and stories.

Cave Dogs has created a method of storytelling by combining shadow performance and multi-media technology. Our medium evolves out of two ancient traditions—shadow puppet theatre and storytelling–and several contemporary art forms– film, video, computer-generated animation and performance art.

The mobility of the high intensity hand held light source allows us to create and change shadow imagery in an instant. Video is projected from both the front of and behind the screen. In this way, the shadow and video work in unity to create a cohesive, multi-layered scene. Performers and props are occasionally in front of the scrim, allowing us to visually shift between two, three and four-dimensions. By revealing our process in this way, we invite the audience to both de-construct these shadowy illusions while they are caught up in the intriguing layers of effects.

Cave Dogs presents a startling original way of telling a story. Fluid shadows and images dance in wild imagination across the screen. We attract a diverse audience with varying levels of experience with art and performance. Our work speaks to both adults and children, to people of diverse cultural and economic experiences, and to traditional and non-traditional art audiences. Each performance promises a healthy dose of the sublime, the exciting, the absurd and the downright fun that will result in something infinitely compelling.