Website Announcement: On Temporary Hiatus...

Things have been quiet lately and there's a really good reason for it.

I pitched a J-Term class to a University down in Indiana where a friend of mine teaches and it was accepted!

Next January, I'll be teaching a nine day, three-credit hour class on the History of Women Animators.

So, the reason why it's been quiet, and why it'll be quiet for a short while longer is that I'm writing the course material and tracking down films to show the class.

Thank you for your patience during this time. I'll be back later on in the year for the Fall Animation Festival Season.

See you all then. :)

Animated Events: DFT Animation Club: Only Yesterday

From the Detroit Institute of Arts/Detroit Film Theater website:

DFT Animation Club: Only Yesterday
Saturday, July 16, 2016 at 2:00 p.m.
Sunday, July 17, 2016 at 2:00 p.m.

(Japan/1991—directed by Isao Takahata)
It’s 1982, and Taeko (voiced by Daisy Ridley of The Force Awakens) is 27 years old, unmarried, and has lived her whole life in Tokyo. She decides to visit her relatives in the countryside, and as the train travels through the night, memories flood back of her younger years; soon she begins to revisit her childhood dreams, wondering if she’s been true to them. This is a newly restored, English-language version of Takahata’s masterpiece, created in celebration of its 25th anniversary. (118 min.)

General admission tickets for films in the DFT Animation Club series are $5. Admission is free to DIA members. Please show your member card at the door, no tickets are needed. General admission online and phone orders incur a $1.50 per ticket convenience fee.

See more and buy tickets online at the DFT website.

Animated People: Erik Timmerman

One day, I was in my apartment doing my daily reading before classes when Erik called me on the phone. Turns out, he needed someone to go to the library, check out a couple of films, and cue them up to specific scenes so that he could show them in a class he was teaching that afternoon. He couldn't find his student assistant and was being called into a meeting, therefore he couldn't do it himself before his class started.

I told him "I'd handle it" then jumped into my car and hightailed it over to the campus library.

About an hour later, I delivered the tapes to his office just in time for his class and went on my way.

I don't know how many other students he called before he contacted me, but as I walked away from his office, it just felt good to know that he did--that he knew that if he asked me to do the job, it would get done, correctly and on time. I can't think of a greater compliment than that, in that one particular instant, he trusted me not to let him down.


Photograph from Andrew Davidhazy's Retired Professors and past colleagues from the School of Photographic Arts and Sciences at RIT webpage.