Learning Not to Be So Sure: Ann Arbor Film Festival Review

by Zoe Ilyasov

Animation is a testament to the timelessness of experimentation and creativity. It is a medium that I honestly had never gotten much exposure to, but watching the animation series Train of Thought curated by Edward Rostron at the Ann Arbor Film Festival brought satisfaction to a part of me that even my non-animation-loving previous self never knew was there.

I wasn’t someone who loved watching cartoons growing up. Strangely, I was creeped out by the notion that lives were being lived and stories were being told through this two-dimensional form; I was watching a fixed reality that had no possibility of existing in the real world.

To say I am a realist is telling.The animation made me reflect on how strictly I view creativity, which is ironic because true principles of creativity lie in embracing randomness and making something meaningful to connect with others.Therefore, artistry comes in forms that work to generate the unpredictable, the nonexistent.

It seems daunting to go far down into a realm of otherworldliness, so far from what we can

superficially grasp as being part of our reality. Frankly, I have always avoided interpreting

animation in my art. I see creativity as a means to create through barriers.The world in my eyes is preserved by what makes us human and real, yet watching the short films made by Royal College of Art students, a collection of archives that go as far back as forty years ago, brightened this notion of what makes us human.The creations, visuals, and movements that went into each student's animation touched me in unexpected ways.

Art, and observing it through animation, shows us how creativity is used as a tool to link underlying emotions and beliefs we share. Amongst the many diverse short animations I had the pleasure of journeying through, Felt, Lifted, and Weighted, by Petra Freeman, captured a beautiful telling of childhood. In a simple medium stop-motion animation on pen and paper, Freeman was able to capture this abstract and experimental transformation of objects and scenes, morphing consecutively into a progression of a young girl’s story. It was beautiful, engaging, and simply complex in its limited detailing through animation but powerful in how each frame morphed to the next. I didn’t expect to feel moved,

but I was.

For the first time in a while, I sat down and allowed myself to just watch art and feel how it moves me. I watched the animations filled with enjoyment; I didn’t allow myself to be influenced by my preconceived notions. I took in a new perspective that I had never seen or thought of, which allowed me to be curious.To ponder. Ruminate. Explore.

Think limitlessly. Pushing myself out of a suspected model, I approached the animation without previous bias, allowing myself to leave the theater with new articulations of what art means to me.

Approaching art and understanding creativity isn’t a straightforward process.There is no simple explanation or instructional guide; it’s aiming for this feeling, more often than not, unexplainable, and finding connection amongst others through pathways you least expect.

Animation isn’t an art form I ever really gravitated toward to find meaning and connection, but it has now taught me that all art forms, regardless of your inclinations, have power and strong capabilities in moving and inspiring us when we least expect it.

I hope Timothée Chalamet won’t come making shameless comments about the animation industry because, honestly, there are limited reasons to doubt the industry’s innovative and vivacious art form, which will hopefully continue to thrive.