Nancy Denney-Phelps's Recent Posts

I have written about the Art Institute at Bournemouth and their exceptional animation program before.  Peter Parr, Reader in Animation and his colleagues consistently produce award winning students who find good places in the animation industry when they graduate.  Peter and his colleagues have plenty to be proud of this year.

Graduates Geoff King and Beth Witchells took home multiple honors for The Great Race, winning The Royal Television Society Award and a £500 award at Animated Exeter.  Richard Williams presented them with his DVD Animator’s Survival Kit as their award at Animated Encounters.

Fish by Dennis Constantinou and Chara Sottou picked up the Best Student 2D Animation Award at Animex and was also a Royal Television Award nominee.  IO, created by Alex Wad, Robert Nelson, and James Swindells was also nominated for the Royal Television Society Awards where it was gained a Special Jury Mention.

Lucerne International Animation Academy 8-12 of December 2009

The institute Design of Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts will organise the first Lucerne International Animation Academy from the 8–12 of December 2009. The goal of this Symposium is to encourage a theoretical debate about current and historical questions of animation as an independent form of the “Moving Picture Production” in Switzerland.

I always look forward to ANIMA BRUSSELS , not just because it is in Brussels which is only a 30 minute train ride from my home in Gent, but because it is a wonderful opportunity to see a wide array of animation.  The Festival, housed in the beautiful Art Deco Flagey building, takes place February 20 through the 28^th, Carnival week vacation in the city, and features programs for all ages.From Hayao Miyazaki’s new masterpiece,  Ponyo on the Cliff by the Sea, which I was lucky enough to see earlier this year to a tribute to American film maker Ralph Bakshi there will be something for everyone at ANIMA BRUSSELS.   Bakshi created the first X rated animated film with his 1972 adaptation of R. Crumb’s emblematic underground comic strip Fritz the Cat.

Riga, Latvia is one of my favorite cities.  The Daugava River running through the center of the city before it reaches the Baltic Sea makes it a wonderful city to walk through.  Riga is a historians delight, full of architecture that reflects the diversity of cultures, from the 12^th Century German conquest and art nouveau delights to 1991, when the country won independence from the former Soviet Union.  The architecture of the Soviet period is still interesting to give you a feel of how the city was when it was still part of the Soviet Block.

Sergei Eisenstein was born in Riga and his father, a famous architect, designed many of the beautiful art nouveau buildings.  The city reminds me very much of St. Petersburg.  It has the same beautiful yellow and rose hues of paint and when the sun light hits at the right angle the city glows – sort of like those evenings in San Francisco when the sunset hits the windows of the buildings and they glow golden.

The beautiful mountain town of Monodendri, Ioannina, Greece was the perfect setting for the 2^nd annual Animart. From July 13 through the 20^th, 54 college age students and 6 professionals from the world of animation gathered in the picturesque village for workshops ranging from clay animation, hand drawn cartoon animation and Maya to sound design and composing music for animation. Vassilis Boutos, director of the European Animation Center, is the organizer and energy behind Animart.

Students from three different South Eastern European countries completed very creative films. Participants were not required to have any prior animation experiences, but with a combination of excellent instructors and some hard work by the students, everyone had a sense of accomplishment at the end of the week.