The fellows of the 2026 Creative Residency for Black Puppeteers!
Here at Puppet Showplace, we had a wonderful 2025 for the Creative Residency for Black Puppeteers — we had our first in-person performance at the end of the residency! We were featured on WGBH! We premiered a new show through our Incubator program that had previously been nurtured in the Creative Residency! And we received so many amazing applications for our 2026 cohort of artists.
And so…we are thrilled to officially announce the artists of Puppet Showplace Theater’s 2026 Creative Residency for Black Puppeteers (CRBP)!
It’s all kicking off Wednesday of this week with the first cohort meeting, and will culminate with Amplify, a showcase of new works by Creative Residency artists on June 13th at the Joan & Edgar Booth Theatre at Boston University.
Over the next 6 months, these 5 incredible artists will develop their early-stage works, meet monthly with their cohort and the program team, receive one-on-one mentorship and support, and attend skill-building seminars, and will also each receive a $1000 grant to support their work.
We are honored to welcome Marcella Murray as this year’s Project Mentor, Tanya Nixon-Silberg returning this year as Community Curator, and Ash Winkfield as Residency Coordinator.
Please join us in welcoming this year’s cohort!
Meet the 2026 Fellows
Beyonce Armstrong
Brooklyn, NY
Project: “The Hood Babies' Tapes: Volume 2”
Beyonce Armstrong, or A Buba Creation, is a multimedia artist who fuses pop culture and fine art, using puppetry and set design to explore Black consciousness and community progression. The Hood Babies series are 30-inch art toys featuring mechanical engineering and messages designed to heal one's inner child through mental reprogramming. Coined Hood-Surrealism, her work combines uncanny dreamscapes with lived Black experiences, drawing parallels between robots, toys, and puppets akin to the lack of self-autonomy often experienced in lower economic communities. Through sculpture, performance, and presentation, Buba makes visual arts and nontraditional storytelling accessible to new audiences.
Follow Beyonce on her Instagram and the Hood Babies website.
Majeedah Johnson
Parkville, MD
Project: “Under the Microscope”
Majeedah Johnson is a versatile storyteller who has dedicated over two decades to producing works across various mediums that highlight the resilience of the human spirit and the power of overcoming obstacles. Her creative endeavors span puppet building, improv performance, songwriting, short films, music curation, novel writing, and storytelling. Majeedah founded Such-n-Such Experiment®, an educational initiative that teaches STEAM-based concepts through original tunes, storytelling, skits, and puppetry. She draws from her background in biology, chemistry, and passion for music to spark curiosity in complex topics for youth, and those young-at-heart.
Follow Majeedah on her Instagram.
Sarah Kenerson
Boston, MA
Project: “Acorn Rock”
Sarah Kenerson is a Boston-based artist whose work explores the intersections of media, childhood development, community-centered artmaking, and folk tradition. Working across felt, performance, video, and illustration, her work centers on play as a shared, connective practice while examining how media shapes collective imagination. She investigates how traditions are preserved and transformed in a globalized world and how modern media generates new forms of storytelling. Through a playful, research-based process, Sarah explores how children and adults build understanding and community through collaboration, hands-on making, and play.
Follow Sarah on her Instagram.
Samuel J. Lewis, II
Chicago, IL
Project: Black Episcopalian
Samuel J. Lewis, II, or Sam, is a puppeteer, teaching artist, and arts administrator whose work bridges tradition, innovation, and community. With a background in theater, Sam discovered puppetry by accident as a performer but quickly realized that it is a powerful medium for storytelling—one that merges craft, performance, and imagination in ways that engage audiences of all ages.
Sam’s artistry spans multiple puppetry forms in ways that explore themes of identity, history, and resilience. His performances have been featured in festivals, cabarets, and community events, where he brings a bold visual style and a deep sense of play to the stage. Beyond performance, Sam is dedicated to creating spaces where puppeteers can connect, collaborate, and grow.
As an arts administrator, he has worked to grow and develop programs that support emerging artists, expand access to puppetry education, and celebrate the diversity of voices within the field. He has been closely involved with Rough House Puppet Arts and the Chicago International Puppet Theatre Festival—organizations that nurture new works and showcase the breadth of contemporary puppetry. Sam’s puppetry practice is grounded in collaboration. He frequently partners with artists in a variety of disciplines. His vision of puppetry is expansive: one that honors the form’s deep history while pushing into new realms of artistic possibility. Through his performances, leadership, and advocacy, Sam continues to help shape puppetry as an evolving art form and a vital tool for connection.
Danyett Tucker
Baltimore, MD
Project: “A Fly Girl's Travel Journal”
Danyett Tucker’s creative practice merges mixed media sculpture, and narrative performance to externalize her personal healing journey. Through her work, she seeks to transform stories of adversity into imaginative pathways toward self-discovery and wholeness. Her characters embody emotional truths — joy, grief, strength, and spiritual renewal — while illuminating the complexity of the human experience. Tucker views puppetry as both a vessel of ancestral memory and a tool for liberation. She is deeply committed to using this art form to reclaim cultural narratives, challenge social taboos, and celebrate the beauty, resilience, and spirituality of Black identity.
Follow Danyett on her Instagram, Facebook and website.
About the Creative Residency for Black Puppeteers
Puppet Showplace's Creative Residency for Black Puppeteers is an opportunity to center the creation of new narratives and amplify diverse voices in the puppetry arts — and it remains the only program of its kind in the United States.
At Puppet Showplace Theater, we believe it is vital for all children and adults to have access to the arts, especially art made by artists who reflect their communities. This residency is about representation, storytelling, and creating space for voices that aren’t always heard.
Since its launch in 2020, the residency has supported 25 Black artists, investing in the earliest stages of production development — and now we’ve added 5 more to that count!
Past fellows in Puppet Showplace’s Creative Residency for Black Puppeteers have gone on to premiere works through Puppet Showplace’s Incubator for New Works (Emmanuel Elpenord, CRBP 2023, Jokes with Josue + The Tales of Turtle Boy) and at the Atlanta Center for Puppetry Arts (Nehprii Amenii, CRBP 2020, HUMAN), Arts Emerson (Dey Hernández, CRBP 2021, On the Eve of Abolition with Papel Machete), La MaMa Puppetry Festival (Anthony Michael Stokes, CRBP 2020, The Scarecrow), Dixon Place in NYC (Ash Winkfield, CRBP 2023, The Harlem Doll Palace), receive grants from the Jim Henson Foundation (most recently, William PK Carter, CRBP 2025, and Leah Lara, CRBP 2022), and more.
Thank you to the many people and organizations who have continued to support and invest in the Creative Residency for Black Puppeteers over the last five years, including our partners for our first in-person showcase last year: Brookline for Racial Justice & Equity; the Town of Brookline Office of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Community Relations; the Brookline Commission for the Arts, and the Joan and Edgar Booth Theater at Boston University.
And, we can’t do it without you — this program also relies on donations from supporters of the arts like you.
Thank you for joining us on this journey to amplify the voices of Black puppeteers!
