ELI PRESSER

"His stories of self-exploration and loss permeate the perpetually changing crowd with visions of intimate ruin acted out under the guise of a tattered handmade doll. The grayish form possesses the persona of Willie Dixon and Edith Piaf commingled in a sexless tragic loneliness."

LA WEEKLY

"Perhaps the most affecting performance of the night took place just outside REDCAT's front door, where Eli Presser worked a small wooden puppet, on strings, accompanied by 1920s French music. As Piaf's voice trembled, the unadorned mannequin crawled across a box, mournfully held his head, tried to stand, fell, and crawled again. The site of Presser, wearing what looked like a 19th century undertaker's suit, conjuring bereavement in a wooden man in the mist at 3 in the morning, was anachronistic, peculiar and splendidly moving."

Los Angeles Times

Presser, who actually looks a little like a marionette when he speaks, with long, slender limbs and loose, delicate gestures, points to that strange dual consciousness as a kind of metaphysical opportunity, a portal through which the puppeteer and his audience gain access to another world.

Los Angeles Times