Animation curation at the upcoming Academy Museum isn’t just about Miyazaki. The museum also touches on less glorious chapters in the medium’s history.
Instances of racist and sexist imagery in U.S. animation are exhibited as part of a multi-room gallery titled “Inventing Worlds & Characters.” Slideshows present problematic depictions in productions ranging from Winsor McCay’s Little Nemo and the Fleischer’s Betty Boop to Disney’s Fantasia and Aladdin.
“We weren’t attempting to be exhaustive,” curator Jenny He told Variety of the exhibits. “If there is a cartoon that traumatized you, we weren’t trying to exclude you. Rather, this is only the beginning of a larger conversation that the museum wants to have.”
