Uruguayan museum. The Museo Vivo del Títere (Living Museum of Puppetry), located in the city of Maldonado and supported by the Ministerio de Educación y Cultura of Uruguay, is home to the puppet collection that Irma Abirad started to assemble in the 1940s. It is composed of pieces of Uruguayan and Latin American provenance, but also from countries all over the world, including Russia, Burma, Italy, Indonesia (Java), China, and Brazil.
Inaugurated in September 1999, the museum was designed by Roberto Cancro. The puppeteers of the company Títeres Gira-Sol, Gustavo “Tato” Martinez and Raquel Ditchekenian (who also run introductory workshops), are the current conservers of the collection. The museum will be home to a specialized library and video-library.
(See Uruguay.)