Editorial

Abstract

This issue of animation: an interdisciplinary journal includes articles from two ends of the spectrum of international animation production. The first three are based in extensive archival research and primarily address Western animation from the late 19 th and early 20 th century, offering corrections, elaborations and new research on familiar works and directors. The last two, that take Japanese anime as their topics, use culturally specific approaches that embed these works in the cultures they were created in.We start in France: in '"This New Mode of Expression": The Idea of Animation in 1930s France', Kristian Moen locates and examines an underlying discourse in an interesting set of archival fragments that demonstrate a high regard for animation as an art form. This is not an isolated case: according to Naum Kleiman, Sergei Eisenstein began his notes for what became Eisenstein on Disney in 1940 (Leyda, 1988: xii), and Leyda's book includes an image dated 1930 of Eisenstein 'shaking hands' with Mickey Mouse. Working with French popular press and journal reviews of animation film, Moen reminds (and informs some of) us, that this regard was commonplace at the time, and that the reception history of animation is somewhat neglected. He argues for a (re-)consideration of animation history specifically together with the form's reception -and less so with it production contexts, technologies and personalities -towards developing a more culturally informed set of ideas about the distinctiveness of animation. Moen undertakes this himself by first discussing debates about medium specificity, to then establish his own stance in this debate in the ensuing focus on key facets of discourse around animation in France in the 1930s. He makes clear this period and national focus is an example for a wider argument he is making. A selection of critics' aesthetic commentaries and evaluations of animation help to establish an aesthetics in these writings, that Moen then extends to other art forms to establish elements of intermediality. His account contributes to wider debates on animation's history, its vernacular reception and its relation to other art forms.Also based in archival research, Donald Crafton and David L. Nathan's 'The Making and Re-making of Winsor McCay's Gertie (1914)' shows how close analysis and working with original animation artwork can reward the investigator(s). It also introduces a new resource in the study of one of the most famous early animation films: 'The Gertie Project', founded by Nathan. In this article, the authors are interested in discrepancies of the ending in various versions of McCay's film and his Vaudeville performance. By closely examining his original drawings, writings, materials and techniques, and through a digitally aided (re) construction, they are able to establish new evidence for and conclusions about McCay's working methods, influences and presentation formats. Informative graphs, illustrations and a wealth of additional contextual information about when, where and how McCay's p...

Para-animation in Practice and Theory: The Animateur, the Embodied Gesture and Enchantment

“…The latter re-inclusion is rooted in critical frameworks developed to understand film vis-à-vis the digital medium (Cubitt, 2004, Manovich, 2001Rodowick, 2007;Youngblood, 2020) and can be described as 'animation 2.0'. Building on earlier scholarship (Furniss, 1998;Klein, 2000;Russett and Starr, 1988), a renaissance of animation studies (Buchan, 2013(Buchan, , 2014Cubitt, 2013;Richards, 2020;Williamson, 2013) has intersected with a growing interest in re-thinking media historiographies and theories from transnational and transcultural perspectives, in light of globally pervasive digital cultural shifts.…”

Achronologies, Materiality and Mechanics of Time in Optical Moving Image Systems

“…In parallel to the complex relationship between animation, reality and fiction, time is explored across multiple realms of reality, materiality and imagination. The ‘magical novelty and the foregrounding of techniques’ (Buchan, 2013: 4; Thompson, 1980: 109) of animation allow the medium to conjure a time unrelated to the Kronos of the real world. Yet animated time can never fully escape the real.…”

“…The moving image artworks incorporate these interwoven media histories, speculating if this might facilitate a criticality towards time experienced in the present moment. This approach adheres to the concept of ‘pervasive animation’ proposed by Suzanne Buchan (2013: 9), in that it aims to increase awareness of the permeating impact of animation in visual culture. Investigating time as an integral part of my animation artworks is a way of revealing and contributing to this cultural impact.…”