ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF ...

impressive aspects of elaborate, larger than life objects. One critic praised his objects as
“more alive and animated than [the human] players.” 209 Another celebrated the “gawky,
heroic bodies and wide-open eyes [and] the genuine passions which these little figures
counterfeit[ed].” 210 Another, most telling, review, commended the “contrivances of that
engaging business” in Bufano’s performances. 211 Nonrealistic and impressive
exaggeration was certainly the standard in Bufano’s showings.
Thus, for his “Voodoo Doctor” megapuppet, Bufano combined the same
aesthetics that had made him famous for Jones’s Oedipus Rex, with an exotic fantasy of
African American culture (see figure 36). Both objects are elaborately costumed; both
have heads that replicate culturally specific masks appropriate to each event. As the
“Voodoo” Doctor’s animal and human, and boldly painted, features are reminiscent of
many masks from the Haitian and Liberian Voodou traditions, Bufano may have
researched these during the design phase of his Hall of Pharmacy exhibit. In the final
marionette, Bufano incorporated imagined Afro-Caribbean authenticity (the details
representative of Voodou masks) with the characteristic magnificence of his work.
Finally, the two megapuppets share Bufano’s innovative strategy of using both
above (marionette string) and below (rod) controls. The strategy gave the megapuppet a
209 Heywood Brown, “Review of Puppets,” New York World. Quoted in: Remo Bufano, “What
the Critics Say of Remo Bufano’s Marionettes,” publicity notice (New York: Remo Bufano Marionettes, ca
1930)
210 Stark Young, “Review of Puppets,” New York Times. Quoted in: Remo Bufano, “What the
Critics Say of Remo Bufano’s Marionettes,” publicity notice (New York: Remo Bufano Marionettes, ca
1930).
211 John Anderson, “Review of Puppets,” The Evening Post. Quoted in: Remo Bufano, “What the
Critics Say of Remo Bufano’s Marionettes,” publicity notice (New York: Remo Bufano Marionettes, ca
1930).
160