Ottawa Fest Online discovers the entertainers of the past

The Ottawa International Animation Festival (OIAF) invites audiences to discover something different for the 2020 online edition. This year's four retrospectives have put the spotlight on highly creative animation talent from the past and present, including works of:

• The animator of Métis Terril Calder, an influential force of independent animation;
• Microfilm, the dynamic and diverse Oscar-winning Norwegian studio that just celebrated its XNUMXth anniversary;
• Emily Pelstring, The fresh new voice of Canadian animation with a nostalgic aesthetic;
• The centenary of the great Estonian animator Elbert Tuganov.

"As much as the OIAF is a celebration of the here and now, and the lights of the future of animation, highlighting the history of animation is also an essential part of the festival," says Chris Robinson, artistic director, who chooses all selections. of the festival and retrospectives. "This is the purpose of these projections: to bring to light animators and studios whose work could otherwise be lost in the past."

Métis artist and stop-motion animator Terril Calder has won awards at film festivals around the world, including Sundance, imaginative and Berlin. He has lectured and taught art over the years with various organizations including the National Ballet School of Canada, the Art in the Park program, the University of Manitoba and Indigenous Roots. His films destabilize and haunt the viewer, addressing a number of difficult issues such as identity, isolation and the unspeakable horrors of residential schools.

The Norwegian study Microfilm it grew from a group of animators who worked in attics and basements to a concentrate of animation. This studio's body of work straddles industry and independence, mixing the commercial with projects of personal passion, an approach that led to a 2015 Oscar nomination for Me and my Moulton by Torril Kove and the Oscar for best animated short film in 2007 for Kove's The Danish poet. Mikrofilm co-founder Lise Fearnley is a member of the OIAF jury this year.

Emily Pelstring she is a sound artist and a performer as much as a visual artist and a director. She also holds a BA in Animation BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD), earned her MFA from Concordia University in Montreal, and is currently a faculty member in the Department of Film and Media at Queens University. Her interests and her creative production make her a true multidisciplinary artist. Pelstring has a film in the Commissioned competition this year and created the OIAF20 referral film.

The first in Estonia to use the term "animation", Elbert Tuganov he had made 38 internationally acclaimed puppet films by the time of his retirement in 1982. More an architect than a poet, Tuganov was someone with a vision and the will to bring it to completion. He was also a pioneer to the end, helping to found studios across the former Soviet Union, holding workshops for children and publishing books on what it means to bring puppets to life. For the modern viewer, watching Tuganov's films is an invitation to change established attitudes.

The special screenings of the OIAF are available on demand from 23 September to 4 October, with the purchase of a pass or an individual ticket, on oiaf2020.ca/watch/films.