Animation, Volume 18, Issue 1, Page 78-95, March 2023. This article examines the critical and cultural framing of the Walt Disney Studio’s cel- and computer-animated feature films according to an enduring art-historical narrative. It traces the critical evolution and historical periodization of Disney animation from the 1930s and 1940s to the post-millennial period, arguing that the studio has often been understood according to ‘early, middle and late’ phases of production that are typically held as both complementary and in tension with each other. Supported by the well-established art-histor ..read more

Animation, Volume 18, Issue 1, Page 59-77, March 2023. Within the fields of animation, media archaeology and film, much attention is placed on the image and the viewer. This article will broaden this focus to explore the moving image as a form of time in an expanded context of animation which triangulates the device with the image and viewer. The devices discussed form part of optical image system artworks that the author has researched and developed. These devices project moving images of light and have diverse historical and opto-mechanical underpinnings. The systems present their own form o ..read more

Animation, Volume 18, Issue 1, Page 42-58, March 2023. VFX (visual effects) breakdowns are short ancillary videos that advertise the digital animation work undertaken by a VFX company for a particular film or television programme. Claiming to take viewers ‘behind the magic’ of VFX, breakdowns disassemble a wide variety of shots and sequences, and point to the extensive use of computer-generated imagery in contemporary blockbuster cinema. But, as much as breakdowns reveal some illusions, they conjure others. Breakdowns operate in a register of speed, fluidity and efficacy, showing neither the m ..read more

Animation, Volume 18, Issue 1, Page 23-41, March 2023. Animateurs are characterized by liminality or, possibly more accurately, intersectionality, vis-à-vis the mainstream and the avant-garde. Their vernacular creative work points to hybrid genealogies that include analogue handmade cinema and performing arts, such as the magic lantern show, puppetry and shadow play. The author proposes that animateurs develop a distinctive practice and theory of animation that can be best understood as ‘para-animation’, i.e. a liminal, nearby, or off idea of animation that critically expands theories of the m ..read more

Animation, Volume 18, Issue 1, Page 3-6, March 2023 ..read more

Animation, Volume 17, Issue 3, Page 271-285, November 2022. In 2014, the British Imperial War Museum (IWM) contracted New Zealand-based filmmaker, Peter Jackson, to use their audio and video archives to create a media-based memorial to the men who served in World War 1. The documentary film, They Shall Not Grow Old (TSNGO), released in 2018, was the product of this collaboration. Jackson took on the project to better understand his own grandfather’s experience as a soldier at the Battle of the Somme. Weta Digital Studios, founded by Jackson, converted the standard WWI newsreel footage into a p ..read more

Animation, Volume 17, Issue 3, Page 267-270, November 2022 ..read more

Animation, Volume 17, Issue 3, Page 334-346, November 2022. Skazka Skazok/Tale of Tales (Yuri Norstein, 1979) has delighted and puzzled audiences and critics ever since its release. It presents a series of beautifully-animated episodes that seem to make narrative sense at the micro-level and that appear to fit together as a whole, but leaves the audience bemused as to why this should be so. The article discusses the history and context of the film, arguing that the ways in which sound and, particularly, music are deployed in relation to its visual elements provide powerful clues and cues as to ..read more

Animation, Volume 17, Issue 3, Page 318-333, November 2022. This article clarifies the definition of ‘Chinese School of Animation’ and chronologically traces this term’s origination and development. The rise of the term ‘Chinese School’ was inspired by the Zagreb School of Animation. Chinese scholars generally define the Chinese School as a set of internationally award-winning films based on the collectivist discourse, which canonizes Chinese meishu films. The connotation of the Chinese School has kept changing in different times of China’s history, and the prevalence and decline of this term ..read more

Animation, Volume 17, Issue 3, Page 302-317, November 2022. Animation in Spain is currently experiencing a golden age. This study identifies 1985 as the starting point for this era and proposes a periodization of the more than three decades since, during which time 120 Spanish animated films have been released. The establishment of new regional institutions during Spain’s transition to democracy was the driving force behind this development, as the newly created governments saw in animation a means of transmitting the culture and language of their own region to new generations. Since the arriv ..read more