Illuminated Landscapes: Experimental Animation & Projection
How can we use handmade animation as an artistic practice to perceive, understand and visualize ecological relationships? Learning a variety of experimental hand-drawn and stop motion animation techniques, students will focus on local landscapes and histories, resulting in a series of cinematic experiments that may be woven into a longer film project. Site-specific prompts will lead us to create animations outside, and we will return our animations back to the landscape through projection mapping and expanded cinema approaches.
The first section of the course will focus on palimpsest animation and basic stop motion techniques. We will meet at local coastal locations to animate “en plein air,” using hand-drawn charcoal and sand animation to perceive and record the surrounding environment, attuning our observational skills to moving images. Students will investigate how stop motion can be used to unveil hidden patterns in the environment and expose forgotten histories. Collaborative strata-cut claymation, cel animation, and time-lapse exercises will encourage students to further engage philosophies of time, including manipulating natural lighting and visualizing deep time.
Next we will shift to analog cameraless animation techniques, using cyanotypes and phytography to create 16mm abstractions with local plant chemistry, engaging ideas of documentation, indexicality, preservation, and sustainable filmmaking practices. Finally, students will activate their animations in the landscape with projection arts, trying various natural landscapes as canvases for our projections.
Short lectures and screenings of artists including Carole Kim, Alisi Telengut, Sarah E. Jenkins, Miwa Matreyek, Corrie Parks, Jane Aaron, Lynn Tomlinson, and Rose Lowder will provide conceptual frameworks for our experiments. Students will learn foundational skills in Stop Motion Animation Studio, Dragonframe, and Adobe Premiere to create and edit animations with sound.
Evaluation will be based on successful completion of assignments, thoughtful engagement in critiques and conversations, and active participation in production exercises.