Animated Thoughts: HerStory

A rather unique exhibit opened on June 6th at the Muskegon Museum of Art. Titled "HerStory of Animation", this exhibit covers the oft neglected history of women who work (or have worked) in the field of animation. Curated by filmmaker, author, and animation historian Mindy Johnson, the women on display ranged from animators (both independant and corporate), ink-and-paint girls, concept artists, inbetweeners, directors, and producers, among others.

The exhibit itself had a really nice flow to it as we were introduced to some of the earliest animation devices, like the mutoscope and the motion picture camera, which seguewayed into some of the earliest animators, like Helena Smith-Dayton, a woman who--as far as we know--is the first woman animator. 

Being someone who collects her artwork, I loved seeing these surviving 'mud people' statues made by Helena early on in her career when she was using them as photo-illustrations for her stories that were pubsished in magazines like Puck.

Was fun to see this particular painting of Helena's from the Mindy Johnson collection. We had actually been bidding on this at the same time when it went to auction. Had I known at the time that she was the person I was going up against, I would've bowed out earlier and saved her a little money--professional courtesy and all that. After all, I do have a number of Helena's paintings in my personal collection already (though this one would've looked beautiful hanging on my wall).

One of the things that I really liked is how the exhibit mixed the current day with the historical. There was a really nice section covering Lotte Reiniger that had a basic model of a silhouette film set-up--which also displayed how her proto-multi-plane system worked. 

But the exhibit also had this nice montage near the end showing current day animators and directors like Brenda Chapman, Lorna Cook, Vicky Jenson, Candy Kugel, Jennifer Lee, and more. It was a really nice look at the women of today and the work that they're producing.

But one of my favorite sections was the concept art section. Mary Blair's work was simply breathtaking--like this painting from her work on Alice in Wonderland.

Or this one from Sylvia Holland on Fantasia.

I really only have two quibbles about the exhibit, and they're really more theoretical than practical: first, I wish that Mindy Johnson's next book, "The Only Woman Animator" (which covers the works of Bessie Mae Kelley), had been available at the time. I've found Mindy's work to be very well researched and approachable. Would've liked to walk out of the Museum with a copy tucked under my arm, but excellence takes time and based on Mindy's prior work, I'm confident it will be well worth the wait.

The second is that I would really have liked to see some footnotes on the placards. There were a fair number of women whom I had either not heard of before or had only seen a little information on over the years--like fellow Michigander Faith Rookus. 

I know that most museums don't do this, but I would love it if the placards had this QR code that could take a person to something like a bibliography webpage or a 'want to know more' webpage. Would be so awesome for people like me who saw the information in this exhibit as just the appetizer! Needless to say, I took lots of notes on the women in this exhibit for future research. Heh, augmented reality can't show up fast enough! Put on those AR glasses and take a stroll through the museum, learning more about the subjects only limited by the speed of your internet connection.

This is a rare exhibit that covers an understudied facet of the history of animation, and I really hope that a lot of people will take the time to see it before it leaves the museum. I personally made a 180 minute round trip drive to Muskegeon just to see this exhibit and it was well worth the time spent.

'HerStory of Animation' will be on display at the Muskegeon Museum of Art until September 27, 2026.

Thanks to Mindy Johnson and the Muskegeon Museum of Art for bringing this exhibit to Michigan.

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Animated Thoughts: No Dungeons, just Dragons!

Well the Sloan Museum of Discovery over in Flint had an exhibit that I just couldn't miss: "The Lost World of Dragons!" As I walked from display to display, I quickly realized that twelve year-old me would've been jumping out of his skin with excitement at seeing dragons and learning about them.

Fifty(ish) me was initially geeked about the animatronics. And then I saw how much the curators wanted the public to engage with this exhibit. The displays were very well constructed and geared for interactivity--lots of buttons and levers and video screens and hidden lights and sounds. But they also had taken a couple pages right out of Lotte Reiniger's book "Shadow Theaters and Shadow Films". Stationed within the displays was a station where you could film your own stop-motion video with dragons in Lotte's silhouette animation style.

Two animation workstations, one on each side

Multi-jointed winged dragon model

Additionally, there was a backlit stage with simple dragon puppets where you could put on a traditional shadow theater play.

There were also some other highly interactive displays, like a puppet show stage complete with simple sound-effects and puppets as well as a virtual-reality headset with this dragon rider game. There was also a station at the entrance where you could pick up a card and watch a video explaining the exhibit and the "Dragon Challenge" game. At various displays, there were symbols to find and copy to your card. At the end, you'd enter them into a display and receive a prize after watching a closing video.

The Dragon Challenge game

They did a really good job on the historical/educational information, not just with the info presented, but how they organized it regionally with dragons from Asia, the Mediterranean, Mesoamerica, and various parts of Europe.

Rating all the museum exhibits I've ever been to, this is definitely number two on that list.(1) It's highly interactive and each station has a lot of documentation with tons of historical information. There are puzzles to solve, artwork to enjoy, and lots and lots of giant dragons! 

It'll be around until September 13th, if you have a kid, or are a kid at heart yourself, I cannot recommend this exhibit highly enough.

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(1) Number one: the Musee d'Orsay's impressionist art collection, Number three: the 'Watch Me Move' animation exhibit at the Detroit Institute of Art.

Animated People: Erik Timmerman

There are certain moments where, when you call them up from your memory, they arrive with such a measure of clarity it's as if you were right back there in that moment. The first meeting we had with Erik on our first day of grad school at R.I.T. was one such moment. I vividly remember him as he stood there at the front of the classroom while all seven of us sat at attention, taking in every word.

During his lecture about what the program entailed, Erik cleared his throat and stated matter-of-factly:

"Graduate school is not about how little you can do, it's about how much you can do."

Of all the wisdom Erik imparted upon me over the next three years, this is the statement that I still think about the most--the statement that meant the most to me if I'm being completely honest. During that first quarter at R.I.T., I had difficulty getting traction as I was thrust into such a new environment. I fell down far more than I ran. But by second quarter, I was learning how to apply his advice towards our classes, and specifically the Photo Core II class is where it really clicked. As Erik was teaching us about the principles of animation, and we were required to animate examples in order to illustrate our understanding, I started pushing the assignments further. Starting with simple animations that just showed the principle, I soon branched out into creating gag films and adding more complex stories and editing. By the end of my third year, I had translated Erik's advice into a five minute hybrid hand-drawn/CGI film that pushed my skills beyond their limits.

Life being what it is, it is not always easy to maintain that level of dedication and focus on projects and on life. But when I find myself lagging behind, Erik's words are still there encouraging me to do more and be more.

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