The Viborg Animation Festival focuses on digital arts and gaming along with animation
EXPLORING THE INTERSECTION OF ANIMATION, DIGITAL ARTS AND GAMING
When I was invited to be on the Short Film Jury of the Viborg Animation Festival I knew a great deal about The Animation Workshop, having seen many excellent films made by their students but didn’t know anything about the festival. It turned out to be a learning experience and I had a lovely time.
The festival focuses on digital arts and gaming along with animation. It also features an artist or artists who push the boundaries of film or gaming who is named the Festival Ambassador for the week. Their work challenges the status quo and personifies the spirit of the festival by breaking down visual walls and inspiring the artistic community.
This year the VAF Artist was the Austrian artist and filmmaking collective Total Refusal. The pseudo-Marxist media guerilla collective focuses on the artistic intervention and appropriation of mainstream video games. By upcycling AAA video games like Red Dead Redemption, Battlefield, and Grand Theft Auto, the collective aims to reveal the political apparatus beyond the glossy and hyperreal textures of video games. Through in-game performances, exhibitions, and Machinima short films, Total Refusal challenges the game designs produced by the game industry.
About selecting Total Refusal as this year’s Ambassador VAF Festival Director Jane Lyngbye Hvid Jensen said “Films and games are much more than just entertainment – they are a reflection of our society and values, and they are a powerful force that shapes us as human beings. That is why we are very keen to share Total Refusal and their work with our audience at this year’s festival, to openly discuss and talk about what we consume and produce and how that feeds in to the world we live in, and the future we are building”.
The six-member collective was represented at the festival by two of its founding members, Michael Stump and Leonhard Mullnere. They presented two screenings of the collective’s work along with an art exhibition featuring stills from their projects. They also screened Knit’s Island. Knit’s Island is based on exploring the communities inside the survivalist online video game Day Z. The 96-minute animated documentary takes the viewer somewhere on the internet, into a space of 250 kilometers where people gather in a community to simulate a survivalist group.
Under the guise of avatars, a film crew enters the site and makes contact with the players. The film endeavors to find out who these people are and whether they are actually playing, or do they believe that they are really survivalists?
I had seen two or three of Total Refusal’s films before and I thought that they were interesting but too long. I am not into video games so I missed the reference points when I saw the films the first time. After seeing their exhibition followed by a screening of several of their films, the full impact of what they are doing hit me square in the face and I am fascinated by it.
The noted writer, director, and producer Jim Capobianco was a guest at the festival. After five years at Disney, Jim joined Pixar and in 2008 he was nominated for an Oscar in the Best Original Screen Play category for the delightful film Ratatouille. He went on to direct the short film Your Friend the Rat which can be found on the Ratatouille DVD. It went on to win the 2008 ASIFA Hollywood Annie Award for best short film.
At his presentation Jim took us behind the scenes of The Inventor. He wrote, produced, and directed the 2023 project. The film is a stop motion and 2D hand drawn feature. In the film the great inventor Leonardo da Vinci leaves his native Italy to join the French Court, where he can experiment freely and invent flying contraptions, amazing machines, and study human anatomy. In the film he is joined by the intrepid Princess Marguerite as he endeavors to uncover the answer to the ultimate question, “What is the meaning of it all?”
For his second talk, A Story Artist’s Journey, Jim told a packed audience about his career path from his early interest in animation to working in the story department of Disney, then his move to Pixar where he worked on the stories from A Bugs Life to Coco.
In 2009 he formed Aerial Contrivance Workshop which he calls “a story design studio”. He was awarded his second Annie Award for creating and directing the 2D sequences for Disney’s Mary Poppins Returns. Jim is an engaging storyteller who kept his audiences completely enthralled.
Running concurrent as part of the festival were several conferences. The two-day CAGA, in its seventh edition, is an AG animation conference. AG is a German academic platform for animation scholars, professionals, industry artists, and fans to explore and discuss the latest trends, advancements, and research in the field of animation. The topic this year was The (R)Evolution of Animation: Current Challenges and Future Directions. Topics covered included The Influence of Technology on Animation, Political and Ecological Challenges Arising from Animation’s Growth, and Ethical Qustions Raised by Emerging Technologies. Keynote speakers included Uri and Michelle Kranot.
As well as creating their own award winning films and VR projects, Uri and Michelle are an important part of the ANIDOX:Lab which is part of The Animation Workshop/VIA University College. ANIDOX is an education, production, and research program for animated and new media non fiction projects. The program includes training courses, VR, and animated film production, a residency program, youth programs, masterclasses, and workshops.
Since 2019 Uri and Michelle have been curating ANIDOX:VR as part of the Viborg Animation Festival. Michelle explained to me that it is “. . . an important branch of our ANIDOX activities and a direct offshoot of the lab and our own artistic VR research projects”.
This year’s ANIDOX:VR exhibition, located at the Gallery NB near to the festival site, showcased four works of non-fiction story telling in emerging technologies, focusing on the craftsmanship of animation and impactful experiences.
I watched Empereur directed by Marion Burger and Ilan J. Cohen. The interactive narrative VR takes you inside the brain of a father suffering from aphasia, a language disorder affecting a person’s ability to speak. It is inspired by Marion’s personal story of her father, who has suffered from aphasia for fifteen years. As a result of his condition, he mixes up words and struggles with every syllable. His cognitive functions and understanding are intact but he can no longer communicate normally. The VR follows Marion’s attempts to teach her father how to speak again as well as showing flashbacks into his past life.
Empereur won the Achievement Award in the Immersive section of the Venice Film Festival in 2023. I found the 30 minute piece upsetting, moving, and mentally exhausting, but it was well worth the time and effort. I am still haunted by the project’s images, it had a great impact on me.
Three other immersive projects were also available to watch. Letters From Drancy directed by Darren Emerson tells the story of a mother and daughter separated by the Holocaust. Maya: The Birth of a Superhero takes the viewer into the world of a South Asian girl’s coming of age and the awakening of her sexuality. When her first period arrives, her world is turned upside down as she is confronted with the traditions and taboos of her conservative family. The piece was created by Poulomi Basu and C. J. Clarke.
The third project, by Ben Joseph Andrews and Emma Roberts, Turbulence, explores a condition called vestibular migraines. Ben Joseph lives with this condition which begins with a strange lapse in reality and goes on to impact his sense of orientation, balance, and spatial awareness.
I was fortunate to be given a tour of The Animation Workshop. Housed in former military barracks, the campus is spread out in a u shape with a grassy area in the center. The Bachelor of Arts Department offers three programs: Computer Graphics Art, Character Animation, and Graphic Storytelling.
Computer Graphics students explore methods of computer graphics production from conception, design, and storyboarding to compositing. Character animators focus on classic animation principles, studying 2D, flash, and 3D animation. Graphic Storytelling goes into drawing, sequential storytelling, layout, scripting, and storyboarding.
When I visited the school, it was a beehive of activities with students working in groups, using computers, or drawing. The hall walls were full of student’s drawings and models sat on window sills. It felt like a very creative atmosphere. I have seen many films by TAW students that have impressed me with their originality and quality. After my visit to the school, I now understand how they can do such excellent work.
I was invited to the festival to be on Short Film Jury along with Danish filmmakers Pernille Kjaer and Steen Bille, a writer and member of the West Danish Film Fund.
We had an excellent discussion before selecting our winning film. The jury selected Shoes and Hooves by Victoria Traub from Hungary. This love story about a centaur girl and a crocodile shoe salesman is a perfect tale of a relationship gone wrong and no matter how much you want to change yourself for the other person, in this case a crocodile becoming a vegetarian, it just doesn’t work. Animation depicts relationships in many ways but this was one way the jury had not seen before and we were charmed by the film.
We also gave a Special Mention to Nun or Never. The film by Heta Jaalinoja of Finland displays a great sense of humor. In it, we follow a nun as she questions her choice of vocations and discovers that everyone in the convent has their own hidden universe.
A big thank you goes to Festival Director Jane Lyngby Hvid Jensen and her entire team for inviting me to be part of the festival. They all went out of their way to make my visit enjoyable and I appreciate their warm hospitality. If you ever have the chance to visit the Viborg Animation Festival be sure to do it. The town is charming and the festival is the perfect place to explore the dynamic intersection of animation, digital arts, and gaming all in one place.
