EVER since its debut season in 2008, the Manipulate Visual Theatre Festival has encouraged us to look really closely at what’s happening on-stage – because not everything that’s said in a production is delivered by spoken text, or indeed by flesh and blood performers. Over the years, happy audiences have had their expectations, and their perceptions, altered by the ingenuity of artists who can make everyday objects take on different functions and personalities – and by performers who can take the human body itself and re-organise it into shapes and states that speak of the very origins of life on earth, and possibly beyond.

At the end of this month, Manipulate will be celebrating its tenth anniversary, and the programme that’s been sourced by director Simon Hart and his team not only reflects the diversity of visual theatre elements that has made the festival a richly-deserved success, it proudly showcases the home-grown work that has gained ground in recent times. Al Seed, Sita Pieraccini and Company of Wolves are some of the talents in that category. You could say that the young Scottish company Tortoise in a Nutshell has grown up under the influence of Manipulate, initially through watching the international work that came in from across Europe and America and then from being able to show its own productions in the festival – The Last Miner and Grit both appeared at Manipulate. Now the latest venture, Fisk – a co-production with the Danish company Katapult – will open Manipulate’s stint at the Traverse (on Saturday January 28) before going out on tour.

In many ways, Fisk is a cogent example of how puppetry and visual theatre has slipped out from under the cliched confines of child’s play. This story of a Man and a Fish has, at its heart, an intensely poetic, thoughtful exploration of depression, and the lengths we go to in order to escape from ourselves. The script was devised with Danish playwright Anne Sophie Oxenvad, a collaboration that was financially supported in the early stages by Manipulate and developed in association with Stirling’s Macrobert. It is the kind of networking and creative interaction that Manipulate has fostered since its own inception, and which has proved increasingly useful to emerging Scottish artists. Such proactive initiatives could be harder to sustain in the future: the impact of Brexit, and the fall of the pound against the Euro, had harsh consequences for Tortoise in a Nutshell’s production costs. They responded resourcefully – and Fisk will now premiere at Manipulate.

In 2008, Compagnie Mossoux-Bonte (Belgium) played clever tricks with Light, luring us into a realm of shadows and illusions. The company returns to Manipulate with their new show, Whispers, again melding physical theatre with muffled sounds and elusive forms in a strange, shape-shifting dream-scape tugs at the darker sides of our own imagination. Agrupacion Senor Serrano, from Barcelona, allowed their own imaginations to run riot when they put together the various quirks that make A House in Asia such a shewd portrait of the discordant times we’re living in. Scale models, video projections and live performers arrive on-stage in pursuit of... what? Is it Osama Bin Laden and we’re on a man-hunt? There’s a sheriff - so are we in a Western? If so, why is Moby Dick in the mix? Obsessions are tossed together, reality checks in – and out again – while the absurdity of it all begins to bite home. The company’s current rallying cry on their website is "Let’s make theatre great again" – it is a beautiful aspiration, folks, and you can tap into it at Manipulate.

Since there’s no show without Punch – and since this is a tenth anniversary whing-ding – the Manipulate team have decided to invite the most famous puppet in the world to drop by. But don’t expect any old, end-of-the-pier, Punch and Judy show. Please welcome Poli dégaine, a new version of the evergreen anarchy by La Pendue that has its UK premiere at Manipulate. This is an uproarious celebration of the commedia traditions and rascally mischief that have kept Punch, in all his various incarnations – Pulcinella, Polichinelle, Petrouchka among them – both timeless and popular. Biff! Bang! Wallop! -– that’s the way to do it!

The whole season, with its accompanying strand of animation alongside a programme of workshops, free scratch events and Snapshots (a.k.a. works in development) is all about how you nurture and present innovative visual theatre to a wider public. Aberdeen’s Lemon Tree, Glasgow’s Tron Theatre as well as venues in Norwich and Bristol, are part of the circuit that has spread out from the Traverse in Edinburgh where Manipulate runs from January 28 to February 4. Details of what’s on where, and when can be found on the website.

manipulatefestival.org