Meet Mátyás Tóth, 2026 ArtsLink Fellow

Your work starts with research and workshops before anything is built or performed. What does that early phase actually look like on the ground?

I never know what will come up. I go underwater first and see what’s lurking there. I’m always where the people are—literally in the middle, observing, connecting.

In my puppetry-based workshops, I engage with locals through the metaphor of the puppet. I get to test how my subject actually behaves inside a specific community: what people there are worried about, what excites them, what they won’t say directly but will happily say through an object in their hands.

My workshops are the laboratory. Every time, I come out with new connections and directions I didn’t plan for.

The research side is just as fun. I don’t just look for the newest research papers; I actively engage with scholars and scientists. Right now, I’m working with neuroscientists in Zurich, who approach my questions from a completely different angle—and I’m not afraid to ask my questions loudly. I love to translate their complex findings back to people through puppetry, turning it into something immersive.

What does puppetry allow you to ask or say that wouldn’t be possible with other practices?

Puppetry is built from metaphor and material meaning—it’s close to ancient totemism. And the political charge of material is enormous: the mediation amplifies rather than softens. The puppet is a lie everybody agrees to, and inside that paradoxical agreement, you can say almost anything.

And then there’s the question the form asks by simply existing: Who is pulling the strings? Who is moving this body? You don’t have to write that question into the script—the audience is already asking it before anyone speaks. That’s the ace in puppetry when you’re dealing with radicalization and polarization, because those are exactly the systems where somebody is moving somebody else.

The other reason is humor. Puppets are inherently absurd. That’s not a decoration on top of a serious subject; it’s the way into it. People will follow you much further into an uncomfortable topic if they’re laughing on the way, and if they’re doing it through an object. It’s scary and fun. The hundredth lecture of the day on political polarization makes people defensive. A naked mannequin shaped by Grindr dates and right-wing propaganda makes people curious. I’ll take curious.

You’ll be bringing the upcoming RENO_ATION performance into your ArtsLink Fellowship next month. What are you hoping happens to it once it’s in a new context?

Performances always adapt—as a performer, I can feel the different energy circling in each space. But RENO_ATION also has a directly adaptive form built in. In this case, I’ll be happily taking control of Chicago and the Public Media Institute, showing everyone the correct (and only) authoritarian path forward. You’re welcome.

But of course, I’m experimenting with the language of oppressive systems, so what I’m really curious about is how that language lands somewhere else. I hope it stays as provocative, as funny, and as question-generating as it is in Switzerland or Germany. For me, the conversations afterward are the real test. A dystopian vision of authority doesn’t mean the same thing in Zurich, Budapest, and Chicago, and I want to find out what the difference sounds like—and how much fresh water I’ll need to cool my data centers.

We’d like to thank Mátyás for his time and wish him a good continuation to his ArtsLink Fellowship.