In this week's episode I am joined by Sue Wallace, professional puppetry artist and co-artistic director of the Sydney Puppet Theatre. Sue was a puppeteer at the Marionette Theatre of Australia in Sydney during the 1980s. She engages in all aspects of puppetry including directing, building and designing workshops.

We discuss the Sydney Puppet Theatre and its initiation of the "One Van" International Festival of Puppetry in Blackheath NSW, which Sue directed over 10 years in association with the Blackheath Area Neighbourhood Centre.

In 2005 she was awarded The Winston Churchill Memorial Trust of Australia to research Puppet Centres in the USA, Europe, the UK and Japan in order to develop a working model for a Puppet Centre in Australia. Since 2010 she has been the director of ImaginArta – the Australian Puppet Centre, which is currently located in the Southern Highlands of NSW.

Sue and her partner Steve Coupe from Sydney Puppet Theatre have toured extensively in Australia and have performed at several international puppet festivals and events around the world.

We discuss puppet festivals among a tonne of other great stuff as we join Sue and Steve in their Southern Highlands home during one of the biggest and most terrifying great Aussie thunderstorms I have ever encountered while driving my little Mazda 3.