Synopsis

Boys Clap, Girls Dance is an animated short about Girl, a pre-teen who exists in an artificially constructed world. She's aware that something is changing but isn't sure how much of it is coming from within her or from the circumstances created for her. We follow Girl as she moves throughout her day, navigating the obstacles, people, and places, that are always in constant flux and that she may learn, are ultimately dictating what she knows about her life and doesn’t.

Dena Springer

Award-winning animator, Dena Springer is an Asian-American animator and illustrator based in Chicago. Her work at once magnifies and reduces behaviours within groups, examining movements, and the divergent response to collective ideological structures between Eastern and Western perspectives. She uses vintage educational videos, antiquated instruction manuals, and old illustrations from children’s books to respond and challenge cultural definitions of role, gender, and identity. By borrowing from the rich animation tradition of the early 20th Century, she scrambles the distance between who we are collectively, individually, and what culture dictates to us about both.