[-empyre-] Animation and desire

Wed Mar 3 00:17:47 EST 2010

There have been so many interesting threads to which I have wanted to contribute over the past couple weeks, but unfortunately (even as we were discussing temporality) time seemed in short supply (especially since I went away on holiday).  So I hope it doesn’t seem too awkward to make some comments now, as a sort of general response to prior threads.

I have really enjoyed the discussions of animation techniques and instruction, the stream of references to so many talented animators, and the overall sensitivity to the diversity of animation production, distribution, and reception.  These threads have made me think of animation or animations in a very different way.  And I found myself thinking about some very old questions about the relation between techno-aesthetic forms and socio-economic forms.

It’s clear that for a lot of us the techniques and aesthetics of animation are a powerful draw, and even through this month on this list we’re creating a sense of a deeper appreciation of making, watching, and thinking about animation.   Because we like animation techniques so much, and because we’re forming a sort of public around this, this gives us a sense of being able to see the process of production in the moving images called animations.  Particularly with respect to more experimental fare or smaller scale production, we tend to focus on the effects of production techniques. Or at least I find myself moving in that direction, probably because I get very geeky about animation.

So this made me wonder about the extent to which it is possible to read images in terms of intentionally deployed techniques, and to read techniques in terms of social form or production dynamics.  I think it was Richard who issued a challenge by underscoring that the techno-aesthetic is not in the software but in how the implications of the software are worked out.

It was a truism of kind of analysis inherited loosely from Marxist analysis and ideology critique that works of art to some extent ‘negate’ their conditions of production. Not negate in the sense of erasing, but in the sensing of masking or distorting or transforming them. For one kind of ideology critique the goal of analytics was to read the contradictions within the work of art back to the conditions of production, as a sort of ideological distortion. In any case, it wasn’t enough to call on the intentions of the artist or author as a final explanation. There were broader ideological issues.

Psychoanalytic criticism gradually transformed this understanding, by shifting our reading of difficulties of the image toward the unconscious rather than material conditions of production.  So there was something deeper than the wills of creators, or historical material conditions (but related to them) — something like a subject formation or a configuration of desire.

In other words, in animation studies, there are still these very large almost unmanageable questions about how the sites of indeterminacy in material technics (say, software) are worked out — and questions about the levels at which are we addressing this — at the level of the artist, of the school, of studios, of movements, of fans or publics, material conditions, or desire?  Obviously, things get sorted out in all these registers, but to make that a conclusion seems to me to neutralize any sense of there being something at stake in thinking through animation specifically, and asking what animation today makes us confront that we wouldn’t otherwise encounter.

These sorts of questions came to mind because it seems to me that in the 1990s, as animation became pervasive or ubiquitous, discussions took a riff on the older Marxist notion of revolution in the context of media.  Which is to say, in many variations on ideology critique, the truth about material conditions is thought to emerge at moments of radical transformation, usually revolution (but then other thinkers added festivals and shocks of enlightenment).  And it seems to me that from the 1990s when we talked about everything becoming animation with the emergence of the digital, it was as if media transformations were a sort of revolution that promised to let us see through moving images to their materials conditions – at the moment of their transformation.

This has become an almost default point of departure, and is useful in many ways.  But it seems to me that there is a risk in us getting carried away in two directions.  First, we can get carried away with a sense that we can read animated images transparently. Second, we can get carried away with an attention to each and every small technical transformation as a guarantee of transparency, which is an overdetermined tendency under conditions of permanent and pervasive media transformation.

Not sure what the answer is, but it seems to me that questions about desire once again become crucial.  I very much doubt that animation studies will adopt the psychoanalytic paradigms of film studies.  The most prevalent psychoanalytic inflected paradigm in animation studies is the uncanny (unheimlich).  This seems to me interesting, but oddly the uncanny in animation studies seems to have been disconnected from questions of desire and from the socio-economic formation of ‘home’ or the Heimlich, making for an generalized unheimlich.  The other popular paradigm is that of illusion or the illusion of life, which as I explained previously is not entirely persuasive, for it has tended to reinscribe a simplistic divide between reality and fantasy at the outset, making fantasy (and thus desire) somehow not real.

I wonder if the re-emergence of non-Freudian psychologies and therapeutic analytics (old and new) in recent years is not of interest to us in animation studies: Peter Sloterdijk, William James, Félix Guattari, Isabelle Stengers, among others, and even the so-called panpsychism of Whitehead.

In any event, given the interest in experimental animation, I wanted to mention some Japanese animators worth a look (last name first), some of whom have already been mentioned:

Yokoo Tadanori
Aquirax
Kuri Yoji
Yamamura Yoji
Kawamoto Kihachiro
Asano Tadanobu
Katô Kunio
Murata Tomoyasu
Tamura Shigeru

The ‘Ganime’ series has produced many art animations, and the recent ‘Aoi bungaku’ does wonderful interpretations of classic novels.  The ‘Fuyu no hi’ series uses an animation by Yuri Norenstein as the point of departure for animated responses by a series of Japanese and international artists in the manner of Japanese linked verse.  There are also recent omnibus animations by Studio 4C: Genuis Party and Genuis Party Beyond, as well as older omnibus collections like Robot Carnival and Memories.

Because of the strength of animation production in Japan, and its decentralization, the line between the experimental and the commercial is not strict, and many avant-garde artists make more commercial video games and animations.  Also, Shinkai Makoto at age 19 produced an animated film by himself on his laptop with as much technical sophistication as Miyazaki Hayao: ‘Voices of a Distant Star.’  It is brilliant. And the IG Pro director Kamiyama Kenji is clearly the next great commercial director in TV animation.

I am sure that I am forgetting lots of names. But I wanted to mention at least a few.

Cheers,

Tom

On 01/03/10 3:45 PM, "Eric Patrick" <ericp at northwestern.edu> wrote:

Joanne Gratz, Joanna Priestly, Caroline Leaf, etc....

I actually think the opposite of what Renate says below...  at least in
terms of independent animation.  It always seemed to me that women were
dominating independent work with innovation of both form and content
(Caroline Leaf and Joan Gratz in the former, Joanna Priestly and Susan Pitt
in the later).

There's no question that there is a lack of presence in television, film and
gaming of women animators (though there's also a lack of general diversity
in these areas), with the exception of children's television which has many
great people doing things (Jen Oxley, Linda Simensky, and Tracy
Paige-Johnson to name a few).

Eric

On 3/1/10 9:59 AM, "christopher sullivan" <csulli at saic.edu> wrote:

> a couple more, Ruth Lingford, Wendy Tilby, Martha Colborn. Kim Colmer, Ariana
> Gerstine, Orla McHardy, Suzzy templeton, Laura Heit. Lisa Barcy, Susan Pit,
> Maureen Selwood, Christien Roche. got to go. Chris
>
>
> Quoting Renate Ferro <rtf9 at cornell.edu>:
>
>> Dear all,
>>
>> Chris thanks for the list of animators below.  There is something that I
>> have been very curious about since we began this whole discussion now
>> about a month ago.  I was on a site (and I'm not sure which one it was)
>> that was discussing the lack of female animators in the field.  The
>> distinction was that many female animators who are working tend to do more
>> documentary, self help animations.  Their observation was that most women
>> artists instead tended to be drawn towards manipulated, experimental
>> cinema and video and not straight animation. (Perhaps we need to extend
>> the whole notion of animation via the fuzziness that Suzanne alluded to
>> early on!) Additionally, Mary Flanagan was here at Cornell a few weeks ago
>> and in a public lecture commented on the overwhelming lack of female
>> gamers in the field as well.
>>
>> Our next empyre discussion will not be beginning until March 8th so for
>> the next couple of days or so I'm hoping that we can all talk openly about
>>  this topic.  I"m fascinated and perhaps misinformed I hope.  Maybe the
>> tides are turning and many young female artists will be drawn into the new
>> technologies of animation.
>>
>> When I first started looking for guests for this topic it was difficult to
>> find any women at all to participate but I'm so very happy that we finally
>> were able to get a great and yes diverse mix as Chris pointed out in one
>> of his last posts. Can you all send me your favorite female animators???
>>
>> Renate
>>
>> PS.  We will continue on for the next couple of days on animation and then
>> open things up for a few days of open conversation.
>>
>>
>>
>>> Hi Richard, there are plenty of non-linear narrative animations, not too
>>> many
>>> feature ones, but then there are not all that many feature length
>>> animations.
>>> here are a few animators, off the top of my head, and the Quay's as well;
>>> janie
>>> Gieser. Lewis Klahr, Nancu Andrews, me Chris Sullivan, Jim Trainor, Simon
>>> Pummel, Amy Kravitze, Karen Yasinsky, Lilli Carre, Patrick Smith, Don
>>> Hertzfeld, Rose Bond, Joshua Mosely, Jim Duesing, Pritt Parn, Brent Green,
>>> Piotr Dumala, and check out the nice work funded by the organization,
>>> Animate
>>> Projects, great british wonders. have a good night. Chris.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Quoting Richard Wright <futurenatural at blueyonder.co.uk>:
>>>
>>>> I always liked the quality in the Quay films where time seems to lose
>>>> all its reference points. Those shots of dust settling or shadows
>>>> dancing where you are no longer sure whether you are watching in
>>>> "realtime" or over the course of hundreds of years.
>>>>
>>>> This also made me wonder why certain kinds of narrative and time are
>>>> almost never used in animation. For instance, why are there no non-
>>>> linear narrative animations? They are not that uncommon in live
>>>> action films - I am thinking of Memento that goes backwards in story
>>>> time (with one b/w stream going forwards), Amores Perros that jumps
>>>> repeatedly backwards and forwards, The Hours with its parallel
>>>> storylines running in different historical times periods. The only
>>>> example of an animated film that has anything like these kinds of
>>>> narrative structure is Waltz with Bashir with its persistent
>>>> flashbacks. And that was made by a live action director.
>>>>
>>>> I wonder if this has something to do with the way that animators
>>>> work, concentrating as they do on building up a sequence of actions
>>>> bit by bit, are they generally less directed towards the larger
>>>> narrative structures of time? By focusing on the duration of the
>>>> immediate event, is it as though they assume a sort of "short term
>>>> memory"?
>>>>
>>>> Richard
>>>>
>>>> On 25 Feb 2010, at 03:34, T Goodeve wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Hello everyone:
>>>>>
>>>>> Sorry I¹ve been so lax as a discussant-generator but here I am with
>>>>> some thoughts and reflections. If it¹s okay just an aside first:
>>>>> off the top of my fingertips‹many of you make stuff you love and
>>>>> live for, also write about with great passion, and the animated
>>>>> worldscape is still and ever will be one of magic and wonder I hope
>>>>> (you have the romantic here), i.e., endless visual and aural
>>>>> reimagings via its ability, or definition, whether anlogue or
>>>>> digital, to do anything and everything within and beyond the
>>>>> spacetime continuum. But sometimes I miss the basic humor, wonder,
>>>>> and sheer ³wow² of the simplicity of animation. I mentioned in a
>>>>> post. The blank page and the dot. We lose track, myself included,
>>>>> analyzing the life out of things sometimes and to do this with
>>>>> animation seems particularly perverse. I realize I set myself up
>>>>> for a bit of ridicule here but alas, someone has to speak up for
>>>>> the puppet doll in Street of Crocodiles who cradles the bare light
>>>>> bulb baby in its arm and brings it back to life with light, or the
>>>>> frayed and earnest bunny who does his best to keep up with the
>>>>> spinning demented ping pong balls and a pair of disembodied knee
>>>>> socks and slippers moving up and down on tip toes in the Quays ³Are
>>>>> We Still Married² ‹up and down, up and down. I think Christopher
>>>>> Sullivan was trying to get at this but not everyone is out to do
>>>>> what he does nor interested in the way I am or the Quays or for
>>>>> that matter, those who use it for visualization, but depending on
>>>>> why you do what you do we are here to discuss the breakthrough
>>>>> insights of theory and technology and animation, but it¹s just
>>>>> sometimes I¹ve felt we¹ve let the technology get away with doing
>>>>> too much of the talking, not that it doesn¹t have a lot to say.
>>>>>
>>>>> But a more hardy, if overly general, topic is temporality and time,
>>>>> now-time vs say the way cinema¹s capturing, sculpting, control of
>>>>> time was such a huge part of its magic. Siegfried Kracauer describe
>>>>> in an essay how powerful just ³having² the wind in the trees ‹a
>>>>> moment‹ captured on film is for him. How different from one of my
>>>>> students when I showed some film, perhaps Tarkovsky,² Why does he
>>>>> keep leaving the camera on the trees so long?² Students of cinema
>>>>> are different. We know this: ADD and short digitized attention
>>>>> spans. But how do you see this in your worlds of animation either
>>>>> in terms of resistance or something emerging that is part of this.
>>>>> One thing I thought was very relevant was the post of the shift
>>>>> tilt which is amazing and disturbing in this respect. Lots to say
>>>>> about it: not only the time lapse but the way the world is
>>>>> miniaturized. Here the real profilmic world is literally made into
>>>>> an stop motion animated ³cartoon². One could talk about the Quays
>>>>> work and time  both in terms of period and affect; rhythm and
>>>>> texture of their worlds (In Absentia, the film they made with
>>>>> Stockhausen, is in some ways about light/time, metaphorically
>>>>> written all at once over and over (the character n the film) hence
>>>>> no time. Endless time. Speed of lightŠ  .) But I do not know what
>>>>> people have seen. I am more interested in hearing you all discuss
>>>>> temporality and animation ³today²‹both theoretically and examples.
>>>>> These discussions are so energetic. They amaze me.
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks, Thyrza
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> On Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 12:39 AM, christopher sullivan
>>>>> <csulli at saic.edu> wrote:
>>>>> Hi Richard, I am the guy that wants animations about love, hate,
>>>>> birth, sex, and
>>>>> death.(not necessarily in that order)
>>>>> your rules of engagement leave me a little cold. why would this be
>>>>> a goal?
>>>>>
>>>>> "greatest possible distance between
>>>>>  human senses and computer code that is achievable through the
>>>>>  simplest material means"
>>>>>
>>>>> what part of the human condition would make this a mandate?
>>>>> why would this be effective, or rather effective at doing what?
>>>>> I know I am being a little aggressive here, but this is coming from
>>>>> someone who does not think Data means anything, nor does emulsion.
>>>>>
>>>>> chris.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Christopher Sullivan
>>> Dept. of Film/Video/New Media
>>> School of the Art Institute of Chicago
>>> 112 so michigan
>>> Chicago Ill 60603
>>> csulli at saic.edu
>>> 312-345-3802
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> empyre forum
>>> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>>>
>>
>>
>> Renate Ferro
>> Visiting Assistant Professor
>> Department of Art
>> Cornell University, Tjaden Hall
>> Ithaca, NY  14853
>>
>> Email:   <rtf9 at cornell.edu>
>> Website:  http://www.renateferro.net
>>
>>
>> Co-moderator of _empyre soft skinned space
>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empyre
>>
>> Art Editor, diacritics
>> http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/dia/
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> empyre forum
>> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
>>
>
>
> Christopher Sullivan
> Dept. of Film/Video/New Media
> School of the Art Institute of Chicago
> 112 so michigan
> Chicago Ill 60603
> csulli at saic.edu
> 312-345-3802
> _______________________________________________
> empyre forum
> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> http://www.subtle.net/empyre

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