Animation Objects!

The history of Animation is relatively new compared to that of the Visual/Plastic Arts. However ever since its inception a hundred years ago, the exponential growth of Animation as a medium (as well as an Industry) has forced us to look and re-examine how we situate it in the broader spectrum of Media and Art. For me, Animation imbibes, includes and exceeds various facets of Visual Culture. As a form of time based media, Animation is closely linked to Film (and other temporal subjects like Sound and Music which don’t share an obvious place in ‘visual’ culture). With regard to static media, Animation is born out of Drawing, Painting and Sculpture. And on a broader narrative level, Animation is a form of story telling. In recent years, Animation has evolved as a form of technology, and has developed into a commercial industry. However, all these mediums have their own sets of rules and standards by which they are critiqued and assessed, and to put one broad requirement over them would only serve as a constraint rather than as a benchmark.

The KRAZY exhibit at the Vancouver Art Gallery is a highly ambitious showcase of work that spans several co-dependant visual art forms like Anime, Manga, Comics, Cartoons, Video Games and Art. As a practicing Animation student/film-maker, I was immediately intrigued at how my favored medium was situated amongst the others. The fact that the venue was that of an art gallery (and not a cinema hall or an interactive virtual space or simply a printed catalogue) meant that it demanded the viewer to see it through a certain filter- one that isn’t the most natural for time based media.

Having shifted my lens, and re-looking at what I had seen earlier in a different context, I became aware of a conundrum of sorts – the ‘Animation Object’. For the first time I found myself putting a value to an ‘object’ in a medium that is broadly defined by objects within a two dimensional frame seen in time. Original paper cut-outs used by Lotte Reiniger from the oldest surviving animated feature ‘The Adventures of Prince Achmed’ (1926) suddenly gained an importance and value quite different than what the ‘film’ itself stood for. On a positive nostalgic note, here was an ‘object’ that I could give importance to- a physical evidence of history in the making. But it begged me ask myself whether the copy of the film sitting in my DVD collection at home was closer to the actual intention/purpose of the work, or the piece of cut-out paper placed behind the protective gallery enclosure.

Having thought about it for a while, it occurred to me that it had little to do with Animation or Art , and more to do with human nature. We, as consumers, are conditioned into giving an importance to objects, even if the object (in isolation) has little role in the reason for its importance. A famous musician’s instrument will sell for a million dollars even though it is only what it is- a consumer product made in an assembly line amongst many others of its kind. Yet, we give it value based on the fact that it played a part in creating the actual (often intangible) work itself. There are numerous examples in each medium that illustrates this idea of our love for objects.

At the VAG, there were other ‘objects’ in the Animation film area that comprised the rest of the Animation exhibit. Original storyboards, cel paintings and distorted film projections set next to one another constituted the design of the space. What it did succeed in doing was re-contextualize the several facets that went into making the medium what it is. What intrigued me was a sense of history and an idea of a process. If the experience of Animation can be compared to the experience of eating food, what one saw placed in glass boxes (at the VAG) were some of the visually pleasing raw materials and ingredients required in making food, but not the food itself. If a correct understanding and evaluation of food is in the tasting, a similar understanding and evaluation of Animation is in the act of watching and experiencing it.

The Animation exhibit in the KRAZY show had several positive elements to it. In a medium that is largely commercially and economically driven, what is missing is a sense of critical reflection and documentation. The KRAZY show at the VAG allows the viewer to take a step back, and look at the medium in a more holistic and culturally rounded way. In today’s paradigm of digital media, what I am left with is an open unanswered question… ‘What will the ‘Animation Object’ of tomorrow be? What will a similar show (like KRAZY) host in the near future as a tangible ‘Animation Object’ in a medium that is growing ever so intangible?