I was blown away earlier today when I discovered the work of Rebecca Dart. She has a fantastic sense for funny appealing shapes, and powerful cartoon drawing. It wasn’t surprising to learn that she works in animation, and again, no surprise to see her credits on her IMDB filled with some of the crassest TV trash imaginable. It’s hard to adequately put into words how depressing it is to know that talent of this caliber exists within our industry, and the rampant cluelessness that results in these artists producing shit like this. It’s like hiring Velázquez or Vermeer to paint the lines in a parking lot — an utter, total waste of skill and talent. Though the animation world has no appreciation or use for such skill, she’s at least able to utilize her artistic voice in the comic books she makes.

(via Drawn)

A reminder that tomorrow night Cinefamily @ The Silent Movie Theatre will present a tribute to animator Fred Wolf. We’ll screen rare clips from his movies, TV shows, vintage TV commercials (like the one above), and his award winning shorts during a live on-stage interview with Wolf himself.

Wolf will discuss his career starting at Famous Studios in NYC, working with Shamus Culhane in the 50s, Herb Klynn on The Alvin Show, his collaborations with Harry Nilsson on The Point!, with Frank Zappa producing 200 Motels, and with Peter Yarrow to make Puff The Magic Dragon. We’ll also get into the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, his producing commercials, shorts and feature films - and how he ended up animating the iconic opening sequence to The Flintstones!

Join me Tuesday night, November 3rd at 8pm. The theatre is at 611 N. Fairfax Ave. just south of Melrose. The first 100 admissions will receive a free DVD of The Point!, and every admission will receive a free Tootsie Pop! Click here to Reserve Tickets.

More John Canemaker news! John will present his do-not-miss lecture/screening on the art and life of animation pioneer Winsor McCay (1867–1934) at the Wexner Center for the Arts at Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio, next Tuesday November 3rd.

As part of the lecture, Canemaker presents Gertie the Dinosaur (1914) the way it was meant to be shown – as a vaudeville act with live musical accompaniment (photo above is from Canemaker’s recent screening in Annecy). The program starts at 7:00 pm at the Wexner Center Film/Video Theater, 1871 North High Street in Columbus, Ohio. The event is part of the current Winsor McCay: Legendary Cartoonist exhibit at the OSU Cartoon Library and Museum. For tickets and information, please visit the Cartoon Museum website.

If you are a member of Asifa Hollywood, this is a killer week: you can meet Henry Selick, Peter Docter and Wes Anderson and see their films at free screenings in Los Angeles. And at each one, yours truly, Brewmaster Jerry Beck will conduct a Q&A with the filmmakers (that’s my mug above with two puppets from Coraline from my session with Henry Selick last week in Ottawa). If you haven’t RSVP’d yet - do it now. Info is posted here.

Tonight at 7pm is the screening of UP with Pete Docter at the Chinese Theatre (6925 Hollywood Blvd.) in Hollywood. I know this is short notice, but they’ve opened it up to all members of the Animation Guild, students from Cal Arts and readers of Cartoon Brew. But you have to RSVP. If you can make it, call (818) 560-4350 right now to reserve your seat - it’s FREE!! See you there!

Filmmaker Michael Sporn interviews Jennifer and Bert Klein about their ambitious new animated short Pups of Liberty and the lengths they to to finish it:

Jennifer: It is hard to sit down and work after you have worked a full day, but I always remembered something Bert would say, “Even if you just get one drawing done you are one drawing ahead.” So I’d try and get one scene’s worth of layouts done a night, or read a track, or just something, and we’d inch forward until we were done.

The Venture Bros. creator Jackson Publick and voice actor James Urbaniak recently appeared on “The Best Show on WFMU with Tom Scharpling.” The interview lasts a couple hours and there’s a lot of goofiness, but there’s also a lot of good discussion because the host, Scharpling, is a TV writer and producer (Monk, Tom Goes to the Mayor). The interview begins a little after an hour into the September 29 program, which can be listened to at the WFMU website.

Speaking of Ninja Turtles… My next screening at the Cinefamily/Silent Movie Theatre in Hollywood is a tribute to animator Fred Wolf.

Wolf collaborated with Harry Nilsson to create The Point!, with Frank Zappa to produce 200 Motels, and with Peter Yarrow to make Puff The Magic Dragon. He’s the man behind the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles TV series, Marlo Thomas’ TV special Free To Be You And Me, the animated feature The Mouse And His Child, the classic “How many licks does it take to get to the Tootsie Roll center of a Tootsie Pop?” commercial (see below) and won an Oscar for his short The Box. He even animated the iconic opening sequence to The Flintstones! Yours truly (Jerry Beck) will present rare clips from his movies, TV shows, vintage TV commercials, his award winning shorts and will conduct a live on-stage interview with Wolf himself, discussing his career in film and his relationships with his world famous collaborators.

Join me on Tuesday November 3rd at 8pm. Advance tickets available now… the first 100 admissions will receive a free DVD of The Point!, and every admission will receive a free Tootsie Pop! Buy Tickets Here!

Above, that’s an actual pencil from the Fleischer studio in Miami. It’s one of the many marvelous fun artifacts animator J.J. Sedelmaier is beginning to post on his Facebook page. Below is a pegbar and J.J. has been challenging his friends to guess what studio it’s from (Click on the image for the answer).

Oregon Live is reporting that Henry Selick is leaving his home base at Laika. The studio did not explain the departure other than to say that Selick’s contract has expired. This follows Laika’s decision to focus primarily on stop-motion and lay off 63 CG animators.

You can read Laika’s official statement on Henry’s departure here.