Fredag/Friday 10:00

SURREALIST SOURCES OF
EASTERN EUROPEAN ANIMATION FILM

In this session, Estonian animation expert Ülo Pikkov investigates the relationship between surrealism and animation film, attempting to establish the characteristic features of surrealist animation film and to determine an approach for identifying them. Drawing on the interviews conducted during his research, Pikkov will also strive to chart the terrain of contemporary surrealist animation film and its authors, most of who work in Eastern Europe. His principal aim is to establish why surrealism enjoyed such relevance and vitality in post-World War II Eastern Europe. Pikkov will conclude that the popularity of surrealist animation film in Eastern Europe can be seen as a continuation of a tradition (Prague was an important centre of surrealism during the interwar period), as well as an act of protest against the socialist realist paradigm of the Soviet period.

Ülo Pikkov (b. 1976 in Tallinn, Estonia), Associate Professor at the Estonian Academy of Arts, department of animation. He is also a writer, illustrator and animator who has directed several award-winning short animation films, including Dialogos (2008) and Body Memory (2011). He is the author of Animasophy - Theoretical Writings on the Animated Film (2010).