1.How does Animate Projects work?

Animate began in 1990 - as a commissioning scheme run by Arts Council England and Channel 4 - supporting 4 - 6 films a year, selected from an open call for proposals. Over the years, it developed an exhibition programme, with partners including the National Portrait Gallery. 

 

We set up Animate Projects in 2007 - and we extended our commissioning to work with other partners, commissioning work for broadcast, online, cinemas, galleries and public spaces. The Channel 4 scheme ended in 2008.

 

We’re not a funder - we curate and produce projects at the intersection of the visual arts, animation and film. We usually work with partners (eg galleries). A project usually happens like this:

we come up with an idea

we approach and secure partners

we raising funding (eg from Arts Council England, trusts)

 

Sometimes we decide ourselves the artists we want to work with, sometimes we will do a call for proposals.  

 

2.How do you collaborate with artists, especially an artist that doesn't have a foundation of making animations or moving image works?

We have only occasionally worked with artists who don’t have previous experience in making animation or other moving image work. eg Edwina Ashton had only made very basic animation when we worked with her - and she teamed up with an experienced animator to make the film. http://animateprojectsarchive.org/films/by_date/2010/mr_panz

 

We have worked with many artists who would not usually describe themselves as ‘animators’, but who use animation or digital moving image in their practice. 

 

3. Can you give some examples of artists that have made films for Animate Projects whose regular practice is painting?  Do you think that painters bring a particular sensibility to the animation process or does it depend on the individual artist?

Edwina Ashton is one (though she works in watercolour, and performance too). Otherwise, it’s artists who use painting in their animation eg Petra Freeman, who animates by painting on clay http://animateprojectsarchive.org/films/by_date/2009/tads_nest 

 

Em Cooper is an artist we haven’t worked with who animates with oil paint:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UuNpwxuA5D0

http://www.emcooper.com/about/

 

4.How does funding work in Animate Projects?

We’re not a funder - we have to raise funds ourselves to commission and produce.

 

5. I understand that you have been in art production for many years. How did you begin your career of commissioning and creating animations?

I don’t make animation myself. 

 

Here’s something about my first jobs! http://thisiscentralstation.com/my-first-5-jobs/my-first-5-jobs-gary-thomas/

 

I worked on Animate from the beginning - when I worked at Arts Council England. But it was only part of a wider artists’ moving image programme. I left the Arts Council in 2006, and took over Animate when Dick Arnall, who was running Animate, died in 2007.

 

6. You have worked with a range of funding bodies, some of which (e.g. the Wellcome Trust) support interdisciplinary projects. Does interdisciplinarity interest you specifically?

For Animate it means collaboration and making work in a specific context or related to a particular theme. The television commissions were more open - people simply applied with an idea for a film - but even then, there was the television broadcast as an important context/consideration. We sometimes use the phrase ‘conversations that wouldn’t otherwise happen’ - and that can mean creative collaboration eg between artists and scientists http://www.silentsignal.org/ or on our current project, supporting artists to work with the public http://animateprojects.org/work-call-for-artists/

 

Collaboration is important for us as curators/producers as well - working with galleries or other organisations (eg an orchestra) - that bring different things to a project eg ways to reach an audience, or experience working with other artforms.

 

7.Do you think animation can be more effective at communicating certain narratives and ideas than still artworks (such as painting) and if so, why?

I would’t say more effective necessarily. But I think animation can engage people in different ways - it is something to do with moving image, rhythm and colour, that makes people want to watch. I think ideas have to come first, and then the reasons why animation is the better medium eg we're currently working with London Sinfonietta, who wanted to find a way to engage younger audiences with opera, and thought of animation as a way to do that. In the way that artists working in painting often address ‘painting’ or paint as a material, so do some artists address ‘animation’ - especially the ubiquity and nature of CGI - in their animation eg Alan Warburton http://alanwarburton.co.uk/spherical-harmonics/

 

8.Do you think animation is more valid in giving ideas as it is newer to us, audience of the art, comparing to painting? 

No. But animation is more pervasive in the wider culture. That means two things I think - it’s a medium that can more easily engage and audience, and it’s important that artists like Alan Warburton question the place and function of animation in the wider culture. 

 

9. Who are the audiences for the films that Animate Projects commissions? Where do the films get shown? Can you give a couple of examples?

It depends on the project - cinemas, galleries, public screens. Films usually go on to be shown at festivals, and we nearly always present the works online. 

 

Here are some of the ‘public spaces’ projects we’ve done -

 

http://animateprojectsarchive.org/films/by_project/group_commissions/out_of_site

 

http://animateprojectsarchive.org/films/by_date/20141/spherical_harmonics/installation_shots

 

http://animateprojectsarchive.org/events/2012/move_on_up_at_canary_wharf_screen/installation_shots

 

10.Do you think art should stick to nowadays technology? 

No! But it shouldn’t shy away from it either. The technology (whether traditional or new) should be appropriate to what the artist wants to do, and I prefer art that is relevant to the contemporary world.