Julian Józef Antonisz

I am finally settling back to Earth after my Beijing adventure, and have been meaning to write up some of my thoughts and discoveries for some time, but stuff has got in the way. I hope to get back in the saddle over the coming weeks and try and get a little more consistent with these entries.

For me, one of the highlights of the symposium on animation that accompanied the 68th FIAF Congress was the introduction to the work of Julian Józef Antonisz through a presentation by Elzbieta Wysocka  from the Filmoteka Narodowa, Warsaw.

Elzbieta's presentation was mainly about Antonisz's non-camera films, where he built and utilised a variety of pantograph machines to scratch an image, or succession of images, directly onto blank film stock. Some of these machines could scratch up to 24 images at the same time by using both hands, but I am afraid i can't find an image to link to. My best description would be a cross between an Ipad, an Etch A Sketch and a Spirograph set, built by an apprentice carpenter/clockmaker in the Middle Ages. The scratches were then smeared with boot polish and soot, before being cleaned and hand painted by Antonisz's wife. He would also burn and pierce in the frames and turn the resulting holes into mouths and eyes of drawn characters.

His choice of non-camera filmmaking was as much a political one as an artistic one. His lo-fi approach enabled him to produce films as outside of the control of state funding as possible - an important issue in communist Poland of his time.

Particuarly interesting are his 'Non-Camera Newsreels':

My Polish is not quite up to snuff, but the first part of this issue is clearly an anti-smoking message and you can see how his ingenious pantograph devices would animate a single drawn image themselves, varying in size or perspective. He must have passed the same piece of film through multiple times, to scratch different sections of the image. Others from this series are also on Youtube, some with more palatable soundtracks - but the choice of the commentator in the issue above is as as fascinatingly eclectic as the imagery. Try no.8 for different approach.

The soundtrack is clearly an important element in Antonisz's work and he is credited with the music for his best known work, How Does a Dachshund Work (1971). I cannot recommend this remarkable film highly enough, and I would love to read more about the man and his work if there is anything in English.

Bon voyage-y

I am writing this at Heathrow Airport whilst waiting for my flight to Beijing to attend the 2012 FIAF Congress. It is annual event for the global community of moving film archives, and this year it also hosts a symposium on the subject of archiving animation - which is why I get to go.
On Monday morning I will be giving a paper about the Halas & Batchelor Collection, but rather than talk about that again I would like to share some questions that form the start of my talk. Questions that I certainly don't answer in the rest of it.
The fundamental one is: why has a history of British animation never been written in its over 100 year history? Clare Kitson gives a great overview in the first part of her Channel 4 Factor book. Going further back Elaine Burrow wrote an excellent summary in the 1985 book "All Our Yesterdays". But these chapters whet the appetite rather than sate it
- Why has no-one heard of Anson Dyer's 36 year career as a founding father of British animation?
- Why is the influential work of the Larkins Studio and Peter Sachs not widely celebrated? Why are their films not properly preserved and available?
- Why is there not a published study of the films of Bob Godfrey?
There are too many questions like this, and I ask them largely rhetorically as I am sure that some have tried to answer them. But when publishers are unlikely to invest in such endeavours then it takes a masochist or a messiah to take such tasks on.
Hopefully this will change, and I think the answers lie in making the films available and getting people to see them with some context - not easy tasks even within the animation community, let alone beyond.
The thing I am looking forward to mostly from the symposium is hearing the situation in other countries. Are we worse off in Britain and if so what might the factors in this be. One of the questions I ask in my talk is whether as an English speaking country then we are affected more by the American domination of the medium? Like I say no answers here for the moment, and I have a plane to catch.
I hope to write up some thoughts about the talks and discussions while I am out there, but I have to do it by emailing my blog via a Blackberry so excuse the formatting.
Bon voyage-y
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More John Halas...

Vivien pointed out this online tribute to John Halas from Hungary.

It includes this image which ties back to "fisherman" John:

The day and the video got some nice coverage on Cartoon Brew and Skwigly.

Happy John Halas Day

Well done Vivien and Martin for this:


Remembering John Halas (2012) from Halas & Batchelor on Vimeo.

boldog születésnapot

Today marks the centenary of the birth of John Halas, a man that Bob Godfrey once affectionately described as “a great womb of animation”. My first encounter with John was via his head. A bronze bust was in the corner of the room in which I had a job interview. I can't honestly say that I paid him much attention, and to be honest had little idea who his was. Some years later, and with a fuller appreciation of his achievements I am in the enviable position of working with the legacy of the remarkable company that he founded with his wife Joy Batchelor in 1940.

Leafing through the Halas and Batchelor Collection; reading articles that John wrote; listening to him speak in interviews; watching the films he made; reading about him in books; hearing people who worked with him describe him: he is a damned difficult figure to pin down. I recently listened to an interview where he talked about his childhood. He was clearly a consummate storyteller, and the truth of his tales is sometimes less important than the practised showmanship with which they are told. But his unique qualities become increasingly clear as you reflect on the amount he achieved. The hundreds of films; multiple books; countless articles, speeches and appearances; awards; the determination and tireless enthusiasm for his chosen art.

John was born János Halász, and his daughter Vivien Halas told me that Halász is Hungarian for 'fisherman'. From listening to people talk about him (not everyone, I will admit) this sounds about right to me; in the sense that he made himself a fisher of men. John brought men and women of exceptional talent together, and then had the good sense to trust his judgement and let them do their job. And John was most certainly an apostle. His religion was his fundamental belief in the power of animation to change the world.

But every time I think I have stepped a little closer to understanding him, I come across a something that knocks me off my feet a little. Last week it was a group of illustrations of Max and Moritz signed “Halas nach Busch” to coincide with Halas & Batchelor's 1976 series. John had drawn the boys merrily pissing into a fellow's top hat, in what I believe was sketch suggesting ideas for tie-in merchandising. Someone else had decidedly different ideas on the marketability of such an image, as “Unacceptable. In poor taste” is scrawled across the top of the page in hysterical handwriting. The same words appear on another sketch of the boys serving up a man's decapitated head on a silver platter, complete with apple in mouth. I have little real clue whether John was genuinely thinking that such images were suitable for a child's jigsaw puzzle, or whether his mischievous nature was simply being provactive, but I am quite happy with either answer.

John's head now sits on the corner of my desk as a polite reminder to get on with the large amount of work required to safeguard the collection of the company he co-founded. I am well aware that by his side should be a physical reminder of the importance of Joy to this whole story, and I am determined that her time will come. But in the meantime, Happy Birthday John. It is a pleasure working with you.