Animation Practice, Process & Production - Current Issue
Animated Change: Women and Genderqueer Animators, Jun 2024
- Editorial
-
-
-
Expanding narratives
Authors: Tania de León Yong and María Lorenzo HernándezThis issue addresses the historical invisibility of women and genderqueer animators. It is part of several continued efforts to document their contributions, raise awareness about their animated work, and centre the voices of female and genderqueer animators in the academic discourse of animation. The editorial provides brief overviews of each article, making emphasis on their shared themes and connections. In this issue we can find a wide range of critical perspectives, that examine how these animators face conventional representations. The authors analyse independent filmmaking and animated documentaries that break conventional animation practices, using feminist approaches and defying dominant narratives. Furthermore, our articles offer a wide range of points of view, including feminist critiques on the construction of iconic Disney princesses and the impact of gender-inclusive writing in contemporary animated series. We aim to contribute to a more inclusive appreciation and wider understanding of the present and future of animation.
-
-
- Articles
-
-
-
Women representing women in the nuclear family: Exemplified by the female characters of the animated sitcom Bob’s Burgers
More LessIn the animated sitcom genre, it can be observed that TV series, such as The Simpsons, Family Guy or American Dad, are mainly created by men. The screenplays are also mainly written by male authors. The TV series Bob’s Burgers represents a change in this regard, as nearly half of the screenwriters are women, which is also reflected in the series’ portrayal of female characters. This article therefore examines which progressive gender identities Bob’s Burgers offers in animated sitcoms. The aim is to compare the female characters of Bob’s Burgers with the female characters in other animated TV series written by male screenwriters in which a nuclear family is thematized. Stereotype analysis will be used as a method for the analysis.
-
-
-
-
Animated documentary as a feminist practice
More LessThis article discusses animated documentaries as a feminist artistic practice. It explores the production practices of independent animated documentaries produced by women and considers existing concerns around commercial animation industry practices historically associated with feminized labour. This article argues that animated documentaries produced by female artists implement hybrid aesthetics and follow broader production trends of multidisciplinary feminist art. Specifically, I focus on the female artists’ commitment to material aesthetics through their use of stop-motion. I examine the effects production environments have on the look of the finished films and on our understanding of labour practices that shape the animation industry. Here, I turn to Childhood Memories (2018) and In the Shadow of the Pines (2020), the films that offer female perspectives on the topics of identity, memory and craft, while the contexts of their production position animated documentaries among feminist art practices.
-
-
-
Creation of texts as sites of resistance and assertion of women’s agency: A study of Sultana’s Dream as a literary text and a film
More LessWomen are largely marginalized from mainstream written cultures under patriarchy. They, however, always tell stories and sing songs, creating alternative narrative spaces. In 1905, Rokeya Hossain, a woman from colonial India, wrote a futuristic feminist utopia called Sultana’s Dream. It became an iconic feminist text, a torchbearer of the women’s movement for the Indian subcontinent. More than a century later, filmmaker Isabel Herguera created an animation feature finding resonance of Rokeya’s text in the struggles of women of contemporary times and generations of women before her. The proposed article involves a close reading of Rokeya’s text, an interview of Isabel Herguera and an analysis of the production of the film. It situates both the texts as important sites of resistance for patriarchy. The collective process lying at the heart of the film juxtaposes diverse styles, collaborations of professionals and non-professionals across continents creating a shared space and ‘agency’.
-
-
-
Animated erotica: An analysis of the films and archive of Guadalupe Sánchez Sosa
Authors: Samuel Lagunas Cerda and Ilse Mayté Murillo TenorioThe objective of this article is the study of the short films ¿Y si eres mujer? (1976) and Niño de mis ojos (2008) by the animator Guadalupe Sánchez Sosa (Córdoba, Veracruz, Mexico, 1955–present), as well as the archive material preserved by the artist, where the filmmaking process is documented. ¿Y si eres mujer? is relevant for the history of animation in Mexico because it is the second animated film directed by a woman and the first realized with techniques like cut-out and collage, steering away from the dominant cartoon tradition. In Niño de mis ojos, Sánchez Sosa experiments with the use of rotoscoping, a very unusual technique in Mexican animation. Using the ‘animated erotica’ category, we want to show how Sánchez Sosa takes a coherent aesthetic and political approach towards the depiction of desire and the bodies of women on screen through animation.
-
-
-
Ink-stained women: Animation reference performers and the body of the Disney princess
More LessThis article argues for a reconsideration of the developmental processes behind Disney’s iconic hand-drawn princess characters. It does so by examining the reference performances for Cinderella, Ariel and Tiana, whose live-action actors inspired the iconic designs and mannerisms that made it to screen yet are so rarely recognized for their contributions. Through sustained analysis of these women’s work as well as how that work was understood and utilized by Walt’s artists, this article reveals previously unseen aspects of patriarchy built into the creative structures of traditional Disney animation. Ultimately, by foregrounding the labour of the women who portrayed these characters in their earliest stages of conceptualization, this piece argues for greater awareness of the multifold layers of performance that the Disney princesses embody.
-
-
-
‘Us weirdos have to stick together’: Wild magic, queer time and queer spaces in Dana Terrace’s The Owl House
By Erin BellThis article analyses American animator Dana Terrace’s series The Owl House (2020–23) through the concept of wildness, as mapped out by Jack Halberstam in Wild Things: The Disorder of Desire (2020). The article moves beyond simply enumerating the genderqueer characters on the programme and instead explores how ‘wildness’ functions at both the thematic and aesthetic levels of The Owl House as it presents wild queerness and wild magic as emancipatory subversions of restrictive social norms. The article places The Owl House within the tradition of the coming-of-age narrative, exploring how its content both subverts and complies with the genre’s conventions. The project also investigates queer time in The Owl House’s narrative before analysing the programme’s depiction of wild magic as a liberatory practice.
-
-
-
The role of non-governmental organization in the growth of animation in Ghana: Girls in Animation as social innovation
More LessSteadily gaining grounds as a professional practice, several associations have emerged aiming to cooperate in terms of financing and skills support for independent animation production. Such corporations have created benefits for practitioners such access to growing pool of talented artist and increasing access to technology. Yet still, the participation and visibility of women have consistently been low or non-existent. Even though the participation of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the agenda for social change has championed women empowerment for decades, Girls in Animation (GIA), is the only Indigenous NGO that has ever emerged to cater for the needs of women practising animation. Using a cases study approach, this study explores GIA and examines the concept of social innovation adopted by GIA in its purpose to effect change in promoting and supporting female animators.
-
Most Read This Month Most Read RSS feed
