Paradise

Personal Essay

The Paper Assignment of ‘Show and Tell Studio’

SooJung Huh / imsjhuh@gmail.com

I never thought that my whole life could change in one moment until I saw ‘Paradise’.

I was an undergraduate in a visual design department, hoping to become a graphic designer. The professor came to class, turned off the light and introduced several short animated films.

Colors danced and lights celebrated all around me.

Phantasmagorical images were brought to life and animated the darkness.

I forgot the time and the space that I belonged to.

I couldn’t breathe.

That was the moment when I first met ‘ Paradise’, a short animated film by Ishu Patel, an animation film director famous for his creative works and his unique techniques. In this film he used a variety of techniques to create images that have the depth of holograms. Before I saw the animation, I had focused on non-animated visual art such as painting, drawing, illustration and design since the age of 6. ‘Paradise’ opened me the door toward time based art and freed me from ‘static’ images. I began to imagine abstract paintings such as Kandinsky’s, Miro’s and Klee’s animated to music or rhythm.

Graphic design was no longer be my main interest. I became obsessed with animation. I was eager to make such animations but didn’t know how to make them. I ordered reference books abroad and tried to find proper materials. I kept researching and experimenting over and over.

At the first stage, I practiced as many traditional techniques of animation as possible and then developed my own style.

Norman McLaren was another important influence and inspiration during that period. His experiments in sound particularly had the major impact on my own animation works. Not only did he resort to parallelism of sound and image, but also he drew the artistic impression through mutual interaction between them. Under such influence, I made a film animation “Triangle, Circle, Square”, an experiment in animating abstract images, synchronized with the music. Animating to the music, I gained full understanding and confidence in “motion” and “timing”.

Norman McLaren defined animation as below.

‘Animation is not the art of drawings that move but the art of movements that are drawn; What happens between each frame is much more important than what exists on each frame; Animation is therefore the art of manipulating the invisible interstices that lie between the frames.’

I couldn’t have understood the true meaning of that definition until I made that animation.

Since then, I have become more eager to experiment with the synchronization of music and abstract image.

For me, the moment of both making and enjoying animation is an inexpressible joy, like Paradise.

I’d like to share, if possible, the moment with people through my ongoing work.