Little Amal is a partly-animatronic giant puppet which was used as the centrepiece of a performance art project called The Walk in 2021. The project was created by the British production companies The Walk Productions and Good Chance in collaboration with the South African Handspring Puppet Company. With the intention of celebrating human migration and cultural diversity, the puppet was carried during five months from the Syria-Turkey border via Europe to the United Kingdom, and walked and took part in locally arranged events in 65 towns and cities along the way. Little Amal was greeted at some venues by local dignitaries, such as Pope Francis, Vincent Nichols Archbishop of Westminster and Cllr Caroline Makinson, Mayor of Barnsley.
The puppet's Little Amal persona originated as a character in The Jungle, a play created in the former Calais jungle encampment in 2015. The name Amal means "hope" in Arabic. Little Amal represents a nine-year-old Syrian refugee girl who, in The Walk project, travels alone across Europe to find her mother. "Dozens" of designers and craftspeople combined to create the puppet, which is controlled by at least three puppeteers: two to move the hands, and one interior puppeteer who walks on heavily-weighted stilts, and controls the head, eyes and mouth by hand via a mechanism called the harp.
In some areas, Little Amal's reception was mixed, with some racist or even violent responses, but in most towns there was no problem. On the South Bank in London, she walked side by side with Handspring's Joey the War Horse.
The Walk
The Walk was a "travelling art festival ... which [was] a celebration of migration and cultural diversity", organised by the British production companies The Walk Productions and Good Chance in collaboration with the South African Handspring Puppet Company. The artistic director was Amir Nizar Zuabi, and the producers were Stephen Daldry, David Lan, Tracey Seaward and Naomi Webb. The project involved "celebrated artists, major cultural institutions, community groups and humanitarian organisations". The event consisted primarily of a puppet representing a displaced refugee child who was fleeing from war and separated from her family, walking across Europe to find her mother, and wishing to attend school: "The puppet represent[ed] displaced children, who [had] been separated from their families, and by travelling over they hope[d] that Little Amal [would] share the urgent message from all young refugees Don't forget about us".
The founders of Handspring Puppet Company, Basil Jones and Adrian Kohler, have said, "The story of refugees is so important for the whole world. Many countries are on the move because of conflict, climate change, farmers that can't work anymore through lack of rain. It's the big story of our time. Because it's an outdoor event, The Walk has the potential of bringing people together again. At a moment when theatres are struggling to re-open this is something everyone can be a part of". Project director Amir Nizar Zuabi said, "The purpose of The Walk is to highlight the potential of the refugee, not just their dire circumstances".
2021 itinerary
Note: The dates below cover not only the dates of Little Amal's passage via 65 towns and cities across Europe and the UK, but also those of other events organised in connection with The Walk project.