Our First Video Art Streaming
We actually have another installment of Sonar, but before that, here's one of Annecy. Igarashi was meant to take us through the last leg of Sonar, but he's still editing! So we'll post that one next time.

By the way, this is the first time that we are introducing video art at AAL. Although we are planning to report on video art festivals and competitions in future, there are always problems with copyright since many of the videos already have distributors. This is especially true for online streaming, and consequently, we're unable to show most of the art at Annecy...This one-off report on Annecy will introduce works by artists who gracefully allowed us to show their videos; namely, 3 artists who seemed very interested in our air artlog project. The interview took place away from the chaos of the festival, in the clean open air on the lawn beside Lake Annecy. I was able to reconfirm the fact that interviews offer valuable opportunities to talk face-to-face with artists.

World's Oldest International Animation Festival
Here is some interesting information: Originally, Annecy was the animation category of Cannes Film Festival. It became an independent animation festival in 1960, to be held in Annecy, the city of water. Until 1997 it was a biennial festival, but since then it has been held annually. This year marks its 30th run. It's an animation festival with an awful lot of history.
While there are a lot of categories, the most treasured is the official selection of short films. There were 674 applications this year, from which a panel of judges - including Tim Burton - chose 56. On the last day of the festival, the coveted Annecy Cristal is awarded. So there we have it, some very basic information for you.

As this is a one-off...
As I mentioned before, Igarashi was unable to edit the final installment of Sonar on time, so I edited this Annecy segment in a rush. That's why I couldn't schedule a guest on time. So instead, I got a hold of Igarashi who was writing narration for a different project at the time, and asked him to help with the "A video that makes you feel like you went to Annecy". Igarashi will be inviting our next guest, so stay tuned.

As we're mainly introducing videos, you don't really get to see the festival itself very much. So here's a video that lets you experience Annecy in 5 minutes. Mr. Mikage from "Beyond the Train Tracks" won an award, which you will see in this video. Also appearing is Reggina Pessoa who took the grand prize. The rest is pretty silly though, so please take a peek if you have the time.

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This was my favourite video out of all the ones screened, as well as the ones I saw while researching Annecy. The split-screen effect is very interesting. It won an award at Hiroshima as well.

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I was looking forward to seeing Isabel at Annecy. Although I could only see still images of her work online, she sent me a DVD from Spain as soon as I contacted her. I sent her my opinion of her work soon after. I spoke to her straight after the screening of her work on the first day that I went to Annecy. Her face was just as I had imagined it, and she was very friendly. We went to a caf - in front of the Bonlieu Theater with her student Rajiv, and talked about various things. She is currently organizing an animation festival in Spain. You meet people, learn information that you didn't know about, visit places, and meet some more people. Next year, I plan to go to her festival.

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An interlacing of sand animation and Spanish music, created by Isabel's students from India. By the way, this won a prize as part of the "graduation films" category, not the honorable "official selection". As with Isabel's piece, this also won a prize at Hiroshima.

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An animated version of "The Legend of 1900". The scene with the keyboard is very beautiful.

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Sarah spoke to us, warning us that "my English isn't very good". I'm very grateful that she graciously talked to us.

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