HUMANITAS & COOPERATION COMMISSION 

Salma Mohseni Ardehali is an Iranian puppet artist, puppet scholar and university lecturer. She studied puppetry and animation at university. She has been working as a puppeteer since 2001 and has been active in writing, translation and research around puppetry and related interdisciplinary fields. She teaches the basics and history of puppetry, puppet manipulation, and voice lessons for puppeteers at the university. Her research interests focus on contemporary puppetry (of Iran) and related interdisciplinary areas. She has been UNIMA-Iran board member and councilor since 2009. She is a member of Iran ASSITEJ and the Association of Iranian Puppeteers. She has been an EC member of UNIMA and head of the Cooperation Commission from 2021 till the present time. As EC member, in support of the Women Life Freedom movement of 2022, she conceived and supervised the UNIMA video project to present voices of female puppeteers who have faced and overcome obstacles to work in puppetry, including puppeteers of the global south. In her leadership, the commission supported Ukrainian and Afghan puppeteers seeking refuge and Brazilian puppeteers requiring help after the floods. The commission has also begun its next project to support the Gazan initiative, “Camp Theater”.