Imagine that you are a renowned chemist, who invents a legal psychoactive drug. Imagine that you push it as a start-up and become the most notorious drug baron of the 21st century. Imagine that all of this is true. How to make a documentary out of this unbelievable story? Let’s animate it, give it rhythm and take the audience on a journey where the high-tech world and academia meet the fauna of the Haifa underworld.
Terra Incognita is a multi-plane cut out animation made from photocopies of 19th century illustrations made during the race to the poles and drawings by Eric Leiser. For the puppet performance it was flat-rod puppets on a proscenium stage with a screen behind them, onto which the animation Terra Incognita is projected. Many of the sea monster puppets and ships performed in sync with the animated ones, along with splashes of water and powdered chalk to mimic snowfall. These techniques came from my time studying puppet theater in Prague, in 2002, and learning from Svankmajer and Svankmajerova. It was a lot of fun to both animate and to perform live with Jeffrey's wonder score. At the same time the film comments on the colonial race to claim the Arctic by various countries—a race that, in a sense, is still going on today, but this time again for oil—and the murders of the Inuit people who had inhabited the land for millennia.
An animated film drawn entirely in pastels. Various fantastical plant-like things "grow" from the ground, eventually launching five spheres. The spheres drift in space while changing shapes and come back down to another setting, which eventually becomes more fantastical and symbolic than the opening one. The soundtrack has a jazz slant, with an ensemble of four saxophones and synthetic sound (i.e. sound created by drawing directly on the soundtrack).
Set in Bangkok, the film shows the process of urbanization of the city while humans lose control over the consequences of their actions and their greed. The story begins and we move underground to meet the two protagonists: a pangolin couple. The two lovers are living a tranquil life in their hidden city beneath, when their quiet is upset by sudden earth shakes provoked by the drilling of a construction site above. Separated by the cracks in the soil, they begin an adventurous journey to find each other, taking the viewer deeper into the causes of the loss of connection between humans and the earth beneath and ultimately, of the pandemic.
One decent citizen was having lunch and indifferently looking at the fish in his aquarium. But suddenly a real monster emerged from the muddy water. However, unwillingness to strain even to save his own life led the hero to slavery. Or maybe nothing has really changed in his life?
A family pod of three dolphins navigates decay as an inevitable register while also having a secret ascension to a higher ground.
The fourth instalment of the Deadly Scent adventure series of short films, in which Zea and Lucius this time resist the snares of the criminal Dr. Goad under the surface of the sea.
An experimental animation by Kazimierz Urbański about transportation. Combines various techniques: traditional cartoon film, cut-out, documentary photos, animation of objects, and effects caused directly on the tape.
This experimental animated short takes a critical look at consumerism in a material world. Thousands of cut-out ads are presented in increasingly fragmented, rapid succession. The film's disorienting and hectic pace seeks to interrogate the extent to which seductive advertising is a shockingly strong force in shaping our desires, needs, and lives in contemporary capitalism.
