AWARDS

  • Ovation Award for Puppet Design for Kaidan Project: Walls Grow Thin, Immserive, 2018
  • Ovation Award for Puppet Design for Wood Boy Dog Fish, Bootleg Theater, 2017
  • Sherwood Award for Directing, Center Theater Group, 2015
  • Nominated, LA Weekly Award for Video Design STUPID FUCKING BIRD @ Theater at Boston Court
  • Nominated, Ovation Award forVideo Design STUPID FUCKING BIRD @ Theater at Boston Court
  • LA Department of Cultural Affairs Brazil artists residency recipient, 2012
  • Nominated, LA Weekly Theater for Video Design HYPERBOLE: origins @ [Inside} the Ford, 2011
  • UNIMA Citation of Excellent for Gogol Project, Bootleg Theater, 2010
  • Nominated, Stage Raw Award for Writing for The Tragical Comedy or Comical Tragedy of Mr. Punch @ Bootleg Theater, 2009
  • Nominated, Stage Raw Award for Direction for The Tragical Comedy or Comical Tragedy of Mr. Punch @ Bootleg Theater, 2009
  • Nominated, Stage Raw Award for Mask Design for HYPERBOLE: epiphany @ SOSE, 2006

PRESS

Critic’s Choice Gogol Project – “Sheer staging opulence and ingenuity combining masked performers, digital animation, immersive sound and music, and, of course, diverse styles of puppetry, this spectacular new piece deftly balances flights of whimsy and depths of darkness.” – LA Times
"Rogue Artists Ensemble's world premiere adaptation of Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean's graphic novel "The Tragical Comedy or Comical Tragedy of Mr. Punch" is an otherworldly phantasmagoria." - Variety
"Sean Cawelti provides invariably clever projections..." - Financial Times NY
"Rogue Artists Ensemble, under the distinctive hand of director Sean T. Cawelti, applies its signature mixed-media stylings of shadow play, puppets, masks and ritualized movement to their best effect yet The perfumed flamboyance manages to be simultaneously solemn and goofy, grave yet playful. Their lens may be contemporary, but within that perspective they immerse themselves deeply into fin de siecle bohemian sensibility, conveying a dripping wetness of sweat, smoke and other indiscreet secretions." - Hollywood Reporter
"Sean T. Cawelti's mind-bending projections the optimum in dazzle..." - LA Times
"This creature (a screen projection, one of many in Sean Cawelti's dazzling design) is about to swallow up ex-gang member Tami..." - LA Times
"Sean Cawelti's integral projection designs define Conrad's new play-within-a-play with not-so-subtle images of Emma screened on Nina's white gown; while his various video imageries of trees and birds (possibly seagulls) play up the whimsy of the Chekov analogies." - Broadway World
(C) Sean Cawelti