Maalarikissat – Joensuu City Theatre

Maalarikissat is an adventure for children combining theatre and visual art

"The door is blue, and through the painted door you go to the color kittens."

The color kittens, Kasi and Masi, are faced with a dilemma: how to make the color green?

Brushstroke by brushstroke, they go through the paint cans, and by experimenting with mixtures, they eventually manage to create all the colors of the world.

Hooray for Kasi, hooray for Masi – it’s time to cheer for the color kittens!

A multi-artistic, fantasy-inspired performance

This imaginative production is based on The Color Kittens, a 1949 book by Margaret Wise Brown, published in Finnish in the Tammen kultaiset kirjat series with a translation by Kirsi Kunnas.

In this stage adaptation, the magical world of the color kittens—where visual art and theatre intertwine—comes to life through the work of a multi-disciplinary artistic team. The ensemble consists of artists working in the North Karelia region of Finland.

The visual elements of the performance are created using animated projections that interact with the performers’ joyful and expressive physical movement. Enchanting images and a fully composed musical score carry young audiences into a delightful adventure where Easter eggs dance the polka and the most important road sign is imagination.

Note! With a strong emphasis on music, visuals, and physical theatre, the performance is well-suited for audiences of many language backgrounds.

Performers: Merja Pennanen and Sanna Kärkkäinen
Children’s voices (recorded): Irinja Klevering, Kerttu Pulkkinen, and Otso Tola
Director: Merja Pennanen
Translation (book): Kirsi Kunnas
Video projection and music: Nikolai Tiitinen
Scenographer: Jonna Kuittinen
Choreographer: Lindon Shimizu
Production: Teatteri Ilmi Ö