Animated By Origins: Africa and The Americas

Catalog description

When working with experimental animation, what can we learn from the Shangaan about compositing, layering and collaging, from the Dogon about counter-rhythms and remixing, or from the Lakota about observation and improvisation? In this class, we will gain a deep understanding of and draw connections between experimental creative practices in selected indigenous/vernacular cultures across Africa and the Americas. We will do this in order to reimagine frameworks for approaching, creating and experiencing experimental media art outside Western canons. Assignments will require students to engage either their own origin stories, histories and/or other archives of their choice or interest. This source material can be personal, collective, public, general, formal, informal, real or imagined. We will look at different ways of approaching archival material (photographs, sound, video, writing, memory) for the purposes of connecting disparate elements into brief and cohesive or anti-cohesive animations. This is an introductory experimental animation class, so no prior experience of animation or video/sound editing is needed.