Eastern European Animation Between Art and Politics, 1945-1990.
Final Report Abstract
When presenting the outcomes of my research at conferences and invited talks, and discussing them at seminars with students, I perceive that two areas resonate particularly strongly with the audiences and the professional community: first, findings on underrepresented women animators (Helga Weiss, Tatiana Zhitkovskaya, Nina Shorina, Zofia Oraczewska, Jaroslava Havettová, among others) and, second, the history of environmental animation in the former socialist bloc. For example my research on the work of Helga Weiss, a visual artist and holocaust survivor who participated in the making of several striking animated documentaries between 1958 and 2011 was published in Apparatus. The Peer-reviewed Open Access Online Journal for Film, Media and Digital Cultures in Central and Eastern Europe where it has been gathering substantial readership. My article Poetics of Seriality: Socialist Architecture in Eastern European Animation was reviewed on the fresheye.cz platform and lead to several invited talks in Paris, Lodz, and Berlin. Ecocritical and ecomaterialist perspectives on Eastern European animation have been attracting a lot of interest lately, leading to my collaboration with the Prague festival Das Filmfest, the guest professorship at Filmuniversity Babelsberg Konrad Wolf, and multiple offers for me to contribute to international book projects. Overall, I believe the research project and my ensuing publications and other forms of knowledge dissemination significantly expand knowledge of the region’s animation beyond national histories and traditional scholarship. The project outcomes stress the importance of addressing overlooked aspects of animation history, such as gender inequality, the marginalization of many animation professionals other than directors, and geocultural hierarchies in the industry related for example to the imperial practices of the Soviet animation production system. The forthcoming monograph, Spaces and Environments in Eastern European Animated Film: Between Inner Exile and Outer Space to be published in Open Access with Amsterdam University Press, is the first to bring a broad transnational perspective to the study of Eastern European animation. It relies on a wealth of little-known archival material, in addition to offering original oral history research and first-hand accounts of animators and other professionals in animation industry from a variety of national contexts across the socialist bloc. Animation emerges as a cultural form actively engaged in drawing attention to and making sense of the profound reconfiguration of private and public spaces under socialism and its aesthetic, social, and environmental impact.
Publications
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Jiří Trnka and Old Czech Legends
Rogoff, Jana
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Der Weg ins Leben. In Christian Kampkötter, Peter Klimczak, Barbara Wurm (eds.), Klassiker des russischen und sowjetischen Films. Marburg: Schüren Verlag, 2019: 113–122.
Rogoff, Jana
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Czech(oslovak) Animated Documentary on the Holocaust. The Visual Testimony of Helga Weiss 1958/2011. Animation Studies. 15.
Rogoff, Jana
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Production and Reception History of Two Czechoslovak Documentaries on the Holocaust: Butterflies Do Not Live Here and On Shoes, Braid and Dummy. Apparatus. The Peer-reviewed Open Access Online Journal for Film, Media and Digital Cultures in Central and Eastern Europe 9.
Rogoff, Jana
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Poetics of Seriality: Socialist Architecture in Eastern European Animation. International Journal of Film and Media Arts - ANIMATED SPACE: Engaged animation for the space(s) we live in 6, 2 (2021): 95-106.
Stefan K. Groenewold
