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Title
World Festival of Animated Film /
3 to 8 June 2019
World Festival of Animated Film / 3 to 8 June 2019
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3_velislava_gospodinova

ANIMAFEST PRO | ANIMAFEST SCANNER VI | SYMPOSIUM FOR CONTEMPORARY ANIMATION STUDIES | ANIMAFEST SCANNER VI - PANEL 1: ANIMATION AND HISTORY

The Animation Cut-Out as an Expression of Long Lasting Spatio-Temporal Artistic and Cultural Processes - Velislava Gospodinova

The focus of the research is the examination of cut-outs as a geographically-spatial and temporally-transformable medium, which tightly binds the animation realm with centuries-old cultural traditions, as well as with the quickly developing modern art movements from the 20th century. The emphasis falls on the conscious use of cut-out in animation, as a special expressive artistic means, aspiring to return towards deep cultural roots, but also to catch up with the multi-layered innovation of collage.

Following the history of cut-out since ancient times, its geographical course and development can be traced to the national traditions of many countries. Some of the most active centres of cut-out use as a decorative art could be clearly distinguished, such as China, Japan, Russia, Eastern and Central Europe and further. At the beginning of the 20th century, a big influence on collage cut-out usage in animation was exerted not only by the geo-location of the nascent modern fine art movements birthplaces, but also by the geographical migration of key artists, responsible for the dissemination of the collage technique. In a wider overview of the cut-out animation, it could be noticed that it has been used either occasionally, by particular authors inspired by the collage potentials, striving for innovative avant-garde visual narration (in Central Europe and the West), or it has been turned into an industrialized technique by national animation institutions, (especially the governmentally-funded ones East from the Iron curtain), keeping to the old, traditional artistic aesthetics, which are more familiar to the people. The aim of the presented examples of these connected processes is to provoke a discussion of the new role of the cut-outs in present-day animation practice.

Velislava Gospodinova was born in 1986 in Sofia, Bulgaria. Her short animation films The Lighthouse (2009), The Blood (2012) and Firebird (2017) have been presented at numerous international film festivals. She works commercially as a freelance art director, storyboard artist and animator. She is also a lecturer in animation directing at New Bulgarian University and Art College for Screen Arts in Sofia. Presently she is a PhD candidate at the Department of Cinema, Advertising and Show Business at New Bulgarian University, with a thesis on the development and application of the cut-outs in animation.