(Burbank, California, April 22nd 2020) - The International Animated Film Society/ASIFA-Hollywood’s Animation Educators Forum has awarded its Fourth Annual Faculty Grants to Zoya Baker (New York University), Mindy Johnson (CalArts), Nazil Eda Noyan (Bahcesehir University, Istanbul/Turkey), Jack Parry (Deakin University, Australia) and Kevin Sandler (Arizona State University).
The competition for the Grants, “designed to provide support for individuals or groups with reasonable expenditures associated with research, scholarly activity or creative projects in the field of animation,” was open to both full- and part-time teachers at accredited post-secondary institutions around the world.
Applicants for this year’s awards came from educators in Australia, Brazil, India, the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States. The committee was very pleased with the high quality and diversity of the proposals submitted this year. They covered a variety of original animated projects including short films, VR/AR and interactive projects, scholarly efforts and conference and/or research travel requests. The Selection Committee selected five that stood out above the rest. So, ASIFA-Hollywood’s Animation Educators Forum is proud to announce, in alphabetic order, the winners of this year’s Faculty Grants:
Zoya Baker, from New York University, in NYC, USA, was given an award to help fund Memory Herbarium, an interactive animation installation which celebrates stories of plants and helps to foster relationships between people and plants through Augmented Reality, storytelling, and co-created animation;
Mindy Johnson, from Calarts, California, USA, was awarded funds to conduct in-depth examinations of existing collections and archival content to definitely unearth details on multiple key women and their pioneering contributions within early animation, to help in her research which formally documents the lives and accomplishments of key pioneering women who developed and expanded the earliest techniques, artistry and production methodologies within animation;
Nazil Eda Noyan, from Bahcesehir University in Instabul, Turkey, was given funds towards the making of “A Tender Dream”, a short musical Animated Film inspired by Mihiri Müşfik, the first woman painter in Turkey who lead an extraordinary life, going against the flow and eventually arriving at a place where she has made peace with herself;
Jack Parry, from Deakin University, in Burnowood, Victoria, Australia was given an award to help finance a research into the creative animation experience in “shared reality”- a phenomenological enquiry into enactivism using a novel system of creative shared reality;
Kevin Sandler, from Arizona State University, in Arizona, USA was provided funds to assist him in the completion of his single-authored book, Scooby-Doo: The Art and Business of an Animated Icon, to be published by Duke University Press. The book debates the nature of children’s entertainment, battles over a free-market approach to regulation vs. governmental censorship, concerns over dwindling broadcast network viewership in the face of cable expansion, and the impact of media concentration and conglomeration upon diversity, quality, and consumerism - with a focus around the Scooby-Doo television series.
The Selection Committee thanks all those who applied and encourages those who were not funded this time to do so again next year.
ASIFA-Hollywood is the world’s first and foremost professional organization dedicated to promoting the Art of Animation and celebrating the people who create it. Today, ASIFA-Hollywood, the largest chapter of the international ASIFA organization, supports a range of animation activities and preservation efforts through its membership. Current initiatives include the Annie Awards, Animation Archive, Animation Aid Foundation, animated film preservation, special events, scholarships and screenings, as well as the Animation Educators Forum.
Raquel Coelho
Chair, AEF Faculty Grants Committee
Monika Salter
Co-Chair, AEF Faculty Grants Committee