Adventure Time creator Pen Ward recently turned me on to the work of Glasgow-based animator David Ferguson, who posts his work at SwatPaz.net. “I don’t know why this guy’s youtube videos aren’t more popular,” says Pen. “I love ‘em.” Personally, I think they’re amusing too. There’s lots of good ideas in Ferguson’s work, and the naive animation and borderline incomprehensible Scottish accent only add to the fun. David has a whole slew of short absurdist pieces on his YouTube page, as well as more random jollities on his website including this page of “cool characters.”

The Haggin Museum in Stockton, California is hosting an “animation family day at the museum” this month. To augment the activities, their archive pulled some untitled animation drawings in their collection for display — and wanted to find out more about them. They contacted me through my Cartoon Research website and I was able to identify much of the material (click thumbnail samples above).

Apparently the museum is possession of a cache of original pencil animation for a series of 1937 Columbia Screen Gems cartoons. Artwork above is from the shorts (left to right): I Want To Be An Actress (a Scrappy cartoon), Spring Festival (a Color Rhapsody) and The Masque Raid (a Krazy Kat cartoon). And there’s material from other films as well.

About this find, curator Kimberly D. Bowden wrote:

“Until now they have been tucked away in the archive. The museum has about 40 drawings for each of the images I sent you and a few other series as well. My guess is that the drawings came to the museum during Earl Rowland’s directorship (1937-1963). He sought out illustrators and their relatives and requested paintings and sketches for the museum.

From this campaign we have comic artists, editorial cartoonists, and commercial artists. Our J. C. Leyendecker collection is currently touring the country. As interest in illustration art continues to grow, I am able to share more of the museum’s hidden treasures with the public. These are the only animation drawings I have come across as yet and I am so pleased to be able to properly attribute them to Screen Gems studio. Thank you solving this long-standing mystery!”

Attached is a little video the museum created to show kids how the animated drawings on display would become ‘animated’.

If you find yourself in northern California this month, it might be a good idea to check out The Haggin Museum at 1201 N. Pershing Avenue in Stockton.

Pssst!

Shhhh… don’t tell anyone, but you can see Pete Docter’s latest film, Up, this Saturday, May 9th for free. If you can get to Connecticut, that is.

There is sneak peek of Pixar’s new feature at the Wadworth Atheneum Museum of Art (600 Main St. in Hartford), at the Wadsworth’s Aetna Theater at 2:00 pm. Admission to the film is on a first come, first served basis, so early arrival is recommended. Doors open at 1:00 pm and visitors are asked to enter through the Avery Lobby. The film will be introduced by Donald Evans, Senior Vice President of Animation Marketing for Walt Disney and Pixar Animation Studios and former West Hartford native. For more information click here.

Beginning this Friday, the Forest Lawn Museum in Glendale will present The Art of Marc Davis. The exhibit will feature non-studio drawings and paintings by Disney animator Davis, one of the “Nine Old Men”. Alice Davis discusses the art show in Glendale Press.

The exhibit runs from May 8th through July 26th, 10:00am–5:00pm everyday except Mondays when the museum is closed. For more information, check the Forest Lawn website.

One of the unspoken rules of Cartoon Brew is that I will link to any piece of animation that combines fruit-people, furries and the song “I Wish I was in Dixie.” I’ve never had to do it until now though:

Michael Nason’s other photo-collage/mixed media animated videos are also worth a look.

The winners were announced last night at the 40th annual ASIFA-East Animation Festival. The top Best in Show prize was awarded to the short film Q&A by the Rauch Brothers, comprised of brothers Tim and Mike. The film, which also competes in Annecy next month, is a gentle, funny and touching real-life conversation between a child with Asperger’s Syndrome and his mother. The other prize-winning film that really stood out for me was the Nullsleep music video “Dirty Rom Dance” created by Plasticflesh (aka Stieg Retlin). The 8-bit artwork style is dime-a-dozen nowadays which makes it all the more rare to see somebody take that visual approach and do something truly original and inventive with it. The video won for Excellence in Soundtrack, a dubious compliment in my opinion; the video game-y music is fine but it was the filmmaker’s pitch-perfect melding of hyperkinetic imagery with sound that truly made this film stand out, not to mention the incredible design and storytelling delivered via a limited palette. Neither Q&A nor “Dirty Rom Dance” are available on-line but keep an eye out for both of them.

There are two exciting hand drawn films coming up later this year - both being released by Disney. The first one is Hayao Miyazaki’s Ponyo, which opens August 14th - several weeks after Ice Age 3 and a few weeks before Shane Acker’s 9. The U.S. one sheet poster was just released (click thumbnail at left to see full size image) which mentions its big-name cast. The French trailer (below) looks gorgeous. I’m really looking forward to this film.

(Thanks, Mathew Gaastra)

One of my favorite short films of the last few years was Jonathan Nix’s Hello. Nix is currently in the midst of post-production on a new short (approx. 25 min.) called The Missing Key. From the looks of the trailer (below) the new film seems to further ideas from Hello, this time heavily influenced by Hayao Miyazaki. To learn more about Nix check his website.