The Animarkt Stop Motion Forum 2019, taking place in Lodz, Poland from Oct. 8-12, will feature three days of professional workshops and exclusive masterclasses run by prominent figures from the global animation scene. Barry Purves, Juan Soto, Angela Poschet and Christine Polis will share their knowledge with participants, and applications for these free sessions are open now until September 5.
Each expert selects the participants for their own training session. Rules, application form and additional information available at www.animarkt.pl.
Professional workshops and masterclasses are one of the three main sections of Animarkt, together with the pitch contest and a business panel. The Forum is the most important event focusing on puppet animation in Central and Eastern Europe.
“Workshop meetings are organized for young artists and those who take their first steps in film production. The groups are small so as to ensure comfortable working conditions and direct contact with the workshop leaders,” says Paulina Zacharek from Animarkt.
The animation direction workshop will be run for the first time in Poland by Barry JC Purves, a charismatic, Oscar- and BAFTA-nominated idol to a generation artists. Over three days (Oct. 8-10), participants can expect many practical exercises that will help them improve their skills in the scope of stop-motion technique. Purves will teach participants some of his tricks and share the insights gained during 41 years of working in animation and storytelling.
At the same time (Oct. 8-10), there will be a stop-motion animation workshop with Juan Soto, who has worked on acclaimed productions such as of My Life as a Zucchini by Claude Barras, winner of many awards, and the highly popular Aardman Animations film The Pirates! Band of Misfits, starring Hugh Grant, Salma Hayek and Martin Freeman. The artist will run workshops devoted to character movement in stop-motion animation, at the center of which will be smooth and expressive gestures of the puppets and their convincing, realistic behavior. He will explain to participants the 12 most important stop-motion rules in a series of practical exercises.
Apart from the three-day workshops, there will also be master lectures open to the public as well as consultations that require pre-registration. One such presentation will be run by Christine Polis, an artist that has been creating puppets, sets and props for stop motion animation since 2002. During an open case study (Oct. 9) she will talk about her work on puppets for many international productions. She will focus on the puppet creation process, so it performs its functions well and can fulfil all the tasks assigned to it in the screenplay. She will demonstrate how difficult, precise and technically and artistically demanding is the art of puppet creation. She will also provide consultation to five projects of her choice.
The masterclass by Angela Poschet (Oct. 11), on the other hand, is a unique opportunity to benefit from the knowledge and experience of an award-winning production coordinator, whose credits list includes Isle of Dogs by Wes Anderson and the Oskar-nominated Frankenweenie by Tim Burton. The case study she has prepared, open for the public, will focus on certain practical aspects of production – from planning to budget management, to organization. Producers and production managers, as well as directors making their debut in puppet animation can also benefit from free individual consultation with Poschet.
Organized by professional support organization Momakin, Animarkt Stop Motion Forum is Poland’s first and Central & Eastern Europe’s foremost international event devoted exclusively to stop-motion and puppet animation. It is a unique meeting venue of the field’s top artists, craftsmen, producers, distributors, broadcasters and investors. Animarkt is co-financed by the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage and the Polish Film Institute.
