The Owners
Fritz Fey was born in 1940 and grew up in a family of puppeteers. Thus at a very early age he fell prone to the spell of puppets and puppet theatres. He has not become a puppeteer himself, but a cameraman for TV documentaries. His fascination for theatre puppets has, however, never slackened. As a cameraman he travelled around the world, and wherever he had a minute to spare he indulged in his hobby: He collected theatre puppets wherever he could get them enthralled by their manifold uses and their varying expressiveness in different theatre traditions. His collection grew year by year.
In 1982, Fritz Fey got the chance to exhibit at least a small part of his treasures within the medieval houses in which they can be admired even today. The City of Lübeck, the Förderkreis Lübecker Marionetten-Theater und Museum für Puppentheater e. V., the Possehl Foundation and other sponsors enabled the Feys to establish the museum and expand it in the following years. In 2003 a snug cafeteria was added to the museum.
For Fritz Fey his museum is a never-ending story. He likes to call it his „project“, because he still hatches many far-reaching plans: audio-guides, live and video demonstrations of selected puppets, presentation of further DVD productions on puppeteering and, above all, enlarging the exhibition space, as about 90 p. c. of what he has collected is still waiting to be revealed to the public.
Saraswathi Fey is the soul of the museum. At home in India she once was a classical dancer and was internationally active. When she came to Europe, she soon met Fritz Fey and was infected by his passion for theatre puppets. They got married in 1991. Today Saraswathi Fey is the museum’s manager and shares the passion with her husband.
About
The history of the TheaterFigurenMuseum Luebeck is closely connected to the biographies of their owners: Fritz and Saraswathi Fey. Without them this extraordinary museum would never have existed.
Vision
Fritz Fey has tremendous love, interest and passion for this culture of art. He has put in lot of energy to create this musuem and also would like to take his collection to each and every part of the world to share it with one and all. For Fritz Fey its a never ending work.
Acknowledgements
Fritz and Saraswati Fey thank their patrons and sponsors:
Possehl Foundation
Förderkreis Theaterfiguren im Kolk e. V.
Mrs. Lisa Draeger
Mr. Harvey Draeger
Mr. and Mrs. Seltmann
Frauen und Kultur e.V., Luebeck
Mr. Bodo Fabian