Pérolas para porcos

Before going home for Christmas, while watching a recording from a 2D lesson I came across a conversation about rotoscoping. I was familiar with it, but for some reason, up until that moment, I thought of this technique as I way of “cheating” animation. But after researching some examples, I realized that, not only was it often used in many animation shows and films, but it was also the most accurate way of capturing irregular motion. For that reason, I figured that rotoscoping was a great method to be more expressive with painting techniques and mixing textures, since I wouldn’t have to worry so much about drawing. One artist that truly inspired me to try this technique was Shishi Yamazaki, who uses her body and films herself dancing and uses those recordings and paints by hand on top of each frame. I found her work so beautifully vibrant but also incredibly personal and empowering.

While at home, in Portugal, I couldn’t stop having ideas related to rotoscoping, as I really wanted to focus on color and textures for one of the animation exercises. Although I’m not the best painter, I feel that the worse painted it is, the more texture the animation will gain. I decided to use Christmas gifts as an opportunity to experiment with this idea, so for my cousin and aunt, I recreated a tiny photo of my grandmother (whom I never met, but they did). I rarely prioritize color and texture over drawing or sketching, so this was completely new to me and I really enjoyed it.

I figure that the best exercise to use rotoscoping was the “body acting”, but I wasn’t interested in only capturing my own movement, I also wanted to capture the movement of clothes. Therefore, I used a song to “choreograph” a sequence of movements, removing each piece of clothing as if someone had just arrived home. I had to film myself over 30 times, until I was satisfied with the video, but I realized that this stage is not merely a reference, like in the other exercises, it’s also the animation itself. I used the song “Barco Negro” by Amália Rodrigues, which is a very nostalgic and powerful fado song (a Portuguese music genre) which talks about someone dealing a loved one that has just departed. Keeping in the theme of “pearls for pigs”, I find it really important for me to include Portuguese language in my films, regardless of its smaller popularity compared to English, as I believe that different languages showcase different cultures, different feelings and expressions and different standards of beauty, right and wrong. In my opinion, the English speaking homogeneity in the different arts doesn’t make us all understand each other, it actually stops people from understanding and empathizing with non-English speakers.

The character in this film is truly Maria Calipso, as it is my body that is moving and I put myself in “drag” through the animation – it’s what I like to call drag animation. Instead of painting by hand each frame, I decided to borrow my housemate’s ipad and use procreate, which I had never used before, to paint over each frame. It was a way to get familiar with the software, and in the process I discovered a range of really good brushes. As Calipso sees a letter on top of her bed she feels surprised, her thoughts are suddenly interrupted, so I wanted to use rotoscoping in a way where I could express the character’s feelings trough different brush strokes, or even painting flowers blooming. The original video is 48 seconds long, which I (obviously) couldn’t complete, so I finished it at a point that made sense (Calipso holding the letter close to her chest). However, I intend to continue this project until the end, since afterwards, reading her lover’s farewell, Calipso rips the letter and falls on the floor sobbing, which would make much more sense with the meaning of the song.

When I applied for this course, not only was I more leaned towards 2D animation, but I was also worried about not having the drawing skills to be a good 2D animator. As soon as I started researching about Seara Cardoso and Abi Feijó, I truly realized how varied animation can be and has been, and my interest in animation shifted to more hand-crafted methods. Having been a pattern cutter, I’m naturally more skillful and stimulated to create three-dimensional materials, and I gained a certain aversion to spending long periods of time in front of a computer screen / tablet. I’ve always been more drawn to details, and if I ever end up working in the animation industry, I believe I would fit in better in stop-motion.

The first thing we learned in the stop-motion class was to build a skeleton for our puppets, using wires and connectors. Then we used foam to shape the torso, and strips of nylon fabric covered in latex to shape the arms, legs and neck. The hands were made with wires covered with hot glue to create the shape. For the head, I sculpted it with foam and painted with acrylic mixed with latex, and created hair from wool yarns. For the clothes, I knitted a tiny jumper, sewed a pleated skirt and used foam and the piping of a leather jacket to build the shoes.

For my character, Zé, I wanted to explore androgyny in the shape of a non-binary teenager In order to achieve that I contrasted a triangle shaped torso, with more feminine clothes and gestures. I used Zé for my Lift exercise, “Zé and Their Pearl Necklace”, in which, as mentioned in the title, Zé lifts up a pearl necklace. As a queer child, I was always attracted to feminine clothes and accessories which always angered or embarrassed the adults around me, accusing me of either wanting attention or having dangerous behaviors that could influence me and other kids to be gay. Gender and sexual orientation are separates issues, and I believe people would have much happier lives if they were not reduced to a gender role. For that reason, I wanted to have Zé to be naively joyful about discovering a pearl necklace in the middle of the floor.

This film took me a few takes to make it, specially because it was one of the first times I tried to animate a puppet, and initially, I definitely exaggerated with the amount of movements I gave the puppet. I learned that “pauses” are important, especially to convey a message, an intention or a reaction. I also learned that if I want to use the green screen in the future, that I need to be careful with the color yellow and blue (besides green). I really enjoyed using the hair as an extension of their emotions, and I was very impressed how quick I can animate in stop-motion in comparison to 2D. Of course building the puppets takes most of the time, but that’s the fun part for me.

For the “Recorded Lipsynch” I wanted to explore drag as a type of performative and visual art form. My own digital media accounts are under Maria Calipso, which is my drag persona/ digital avatar, and more importantly, the name that I go by in drag. Personally, drag has made me confront my own desire in keeping that reality even after taking it off, which lead me into a path of self-exploration regarding my own gender identity, which I try to explore in my own creative work.

Drag in its nature is clearly political and forces audiences to confront the barriers of the binary heteronormative standards of gender. As an animator, I like to believe I can do the same. For that reason I chose a verse from a poem of António Botto, a Portuguese homoerotic poet whose work had been censored from 1923 to 1974, but it is still silenced today in Portugal. (I must admit that even I only found out about him recently).

The Portuguese dictatorship started in the late 20’s, but in the early 20’s Lisbon had a gay and drag scene, and Botto, alongside super famous Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa, were part of it. Thanks to Pessoa’s support, Botto was able to publish in 1921 his book “Canções” that explicitly described same-sex love in a very nonchalant and romantic way. Unfortunately, the conservative and catholic Lisbon Students Action League pushed for local authorities to apprehend the books and in response to that António Botto wrote the poem “Words of a Grey Ostrich”, in which he imagines himself being an ostrich whose feathers are being removed by those that disdain it, and it suffers without doing anything because “no one loves their homeland for being great, but because it’s theirs” (“Ninguém ama a sua pátria por ser grande, mas sim por ser sua).

Because of the meaning of this expression, it was important to me to detach the character from the same “patriotic” experience that I have, especially since I grew up being part of a majority-ethic group in Portugal. The reason why this expression is so relevant today, is because it’s becoming more common than ever for far-right groups to attack ethnic and religious minorities in the name of their country, their self-entitled possession. Having the opportunity and privilege to create animation for a living, it’s my responsibility to be as inclusive to different ethnic experiences in my own work, and especially for this lip synch. Teresa “Teté” Dandalunda is an Angolan bearded queen and similarly to Maria Calipso, they are both “tágides” (mythological Tagus nymphs from Camões poetry “Lusíadas” (1572)), drag nymphs of the river Tagus in Lisbon (Calipso from Odyssey’s (1617) Calypso and Dandalunda from bantu mythology).

To build this character I used foam to sculpt and clay as an exterior layer. The arms, torso, neck and hands are also structured with wires, and I used miliput to attach the hands. To animate this exercise, I used a video as a visual reference for both my hand movements, facial expressions and my mouth shapes, but also as a sound reference for the duration of the frames. Since I gave Teté a beard, I decided to take advantage of that and created multiple removable chins with different moth shapes. For the background I borrowed scraps of purple shiny fabric from the Costume Department and hanged them on a wood frame. I wanted Teté to look like she was on the centre of a stage in a drag bar, so I decided to play with the transition of lights and having her highlighted from high above. Cynthia was the one who suggested me to have the light gradually intensifying in multiple frames, which was a great tip.

In the previous term, while researching for Abi Feijó’s work, cutout animation was one of the types of animation that caught my eye. Even more so, when I was introduced to Lotte Reiniger, Yuri Norstein or by Chinese cutout animations in Cynthia’s presentation, like Wan Guchan’s work and the “Calabash Brothers”

Personally I grew up watching “Angela Anaconda”, so it’s a type of motion that I’m used to and that I genuinely find nostalgic. I really enjoy how much detail there can be in a frame of a cutout animation and how you can play with texture, layering and depth. You can literally preserve the original drawings and artwork and use those to animate. From LIAF, I was really inspired by “Half of an Apple” from Xiaolin Zhou.

For that reason, I decided to challenge myself and animate a raccoon for the “Quadruped Walk” exercise. My intention was to take the expression “Pearls for Pigs” almost literally, but having a raccoon picking up a pearl bracelet, instead of a pig, showing how even animals are naturally attracted to shiny beautiful things, even if they can’t understand its worth. Thanks to my background as a pattern cutter, the concept of drawing and cutting pieces of paper that overlay each other, wasn’t necessarily new to me. For the raccoon’s movement, I used as a reference the two sequences of photos from Eadweard Muybridge, since they showed it not only walking, but also running and turning, which was convenient to play with depth.

The biggest challenge for me initially was to create a background hat could enhance the depth of the shot, and more importantly that would be movable. I decided to play with the camera for this exercise and have the raccoon get in the frame, and as soon as he gets to the centre, the camera chases him until the end of his walk, staying still for the last shot, where the raccoon turns and leaves the shot. I decided to cut the sky in the same width as the shot, as it doesn’t move, whereas the fence and the floor move alongside the raccoon. I used the garden of the house I’m living in at the moment, in Walthamstow, which I thought it could be nice to record it or document it while I’m here.

I’m quite happy with the end result, even though there are clearly things that I can improve on. I have to be careful with the background next time, and make sure it hasn’t moved after I have animated the characters. I would also like to work with laser cutting printers and mix different textures and materials. I have to figure out a better way than blu tack to stick the pieces of paper together, as it made the animation much more challenging than I anticipated.

For this blog’s title, and as a theme for this semester’s series of exercises I decided to follow the Portuguese expression “É como dar pérolas a porcos”, which translates to “It’s like giving pearls to pigs”, or as I believe you more commonly say “like casting my pearls before the swine”. In other words, it refers to when we offer a gift to someone who can’t value it for what it truly is.

For the Unit 1 assignments I wanted to experiment with different animation techniques but maintain a subversive message throughout. As a queer gender non-confirming person, I have grown to love my femininity in my male body, and I believe that it gave me an amazing armor to navigate this world. Unfortunately, feminine men, masculine women and androgynous characters have often been portrayed as deceiving, foreign, blasphemous and very rarely have been given center-stage – when that’s where we shine the brightest. Gender-queer people have existed throughout all our history – there was a even a Roman emperor called Heliogabalus – and in several societies we were given the caregiver, healer or educator role. However, most of the documentation of our own existence has been erased through colonization and religious wars. As an animator, and more importantly as an artist, it’s my responsibility to carry that legacy with me and through the work that I do.

For the first assignment, the “Bouncing Creature”, I created “Piglet with Pearls”. I decided to literally “personify” the expression itself and animated a bouncing piglet decorated with pearl earrings and necklace. I though it would be interesting to use the jewelry to create a follow-through effect. There is something endearing, and quite relatable I must admit, about designing an animal that is usually associated with dirt and sloth, bouncing happily bedazzled in jewels.

This past weekend I had the opportunity to see the painting exhibition “Mixing it Up: Painting Today” in Hayward Gallery. It showcases the most recent work of emerging artists with the aim of reflecting the different styles of painting that are being done today. Painting is my favorite art form after Film, and I am very interested in discovering new artists and absorbing inspiration for my own personal work. I went to this exhibition with a friend and I was very curious to see that we were both attracted to very different paintings and it made me wonder why. Paintings seemed to cause different emotions on people and sometimes certain images, textures or combinations of colors can resemble some random patterns or memories engraved in our personal subconscious. I wanted to list down some of the artists, whose work I felt more attracted to with the objective of understanding : what is it, that my brain craves visually?

Lisa Brice’s work felt like it was in motion, like a shot in the middle of scene that was taking place. There was a lot of focus in shapes and color, instead of lines. I really like that her work is very subtle but still very detailed. Her figures had an active role, even though they barely had faces, almost as if they didn’t need be expressive to tell you how they feel, which I find so powerful.

Then there was Kudzanai -Violet Hwami, whose work I could almost say it was violently colorful. Beautifully painted portraits that were splashed with vivid colors and scratched with doodles on top. I love that there’s a mixture between impulsive expression with highly technical painting. There’s an aspect of collage and playfulness in her paintings which is combined with emotionally charged brush strokes and even personal elements of the artist’s life. Through her paintings, Hwami gives life to her distant memories of her childhood in Zimbabwe.

Mohammed Sami, an Iraqi refugee, has beautifully poetic and symbolic work. He paints objects and spaces that trigger memories and images from his experience in the war of Iraq or as a refugee. There are very elegant combinations of color and shape mixed with very smart use of shadows. His work is a great example of how to convey depth of emotion without any human figures or performative aspect. It’s interesting how you can create such an unsettling feeling but still apply very soft colors.

Finally, I just wanted to give special mention to a few more artists that have left a very strong impression on me as well. Graham Little and his elegant slice of life portraits that feel like a 1980’s fashion advertisement. Louise Giovanelli and her vintage dreamy “out-of-focus” close-ups, that reminded me so much of images from a 1970’s film. And Rachel Jones and her sugar rush explosions of vibrant color and texture in a beautiful abstractive maze.

I think overall, I’m attracted to color and mood. I have a tendency to like drawings with people or characters in it, but if an image transports me to a narrative or a universe of some kind, I will feel especially drawn to it. I also feel very conscious of image composition, the placement of the different shapes, elements or objects in regards to the angle of the image. And then there’s color, what attracts my eyes the most, but by far the creative element that I have the least control over – definitely the next obstacle that I need to tackle!

The “interventive” aspect of Abi Feijó and Seara Cardoso’s work is also noted in the impact and influence they had in the animation industry and puppet theatre in Portugal. Not only were they trailblazers for their own styles of storytelling, but they were also responsible to create animation studios, theatre companies, museums and courses which allowed for their knowledge and experience to be passed on to the following generations.

Sadly, João Paulo Seara Cardoso passed away way in 2010, but his work is very much still alive through his company “Marionetas do Porto”, a puppet theatre company founded in 1988 in Porto, Portugal. The company rose to prominence with “Vai no Batalha” (1993), a political satire play that criticizes the ruling politicians of that time (like Cavaco Silva and Mário Soares), pays homage to the traditional “revista” style of theatre and comments on the current situation of Porto through the perspective of its citizens. After destroying this set and refusing taking this play to Lisbon, Seara Cardoso says “Having a big audience isn’t the most important thing. What really matters is to create theatre that we believe in and with great honesty.”

Throughout his career, he staged more than 30 theatre puppet plays, non-puppet plays, operas and wrote 9 children’s books. In puppet theatre, he developed a style that was unafraid to reveal its actors and known for mixing puppets with other art forms, such as dance, music, sculpture and installations, as well as his passion for mechanical engineering. For example, in his last play,”Make Love Not War” (2010), he was able to combine his fascination for moving engines and puppetry to adapt the greek play “Lysistrata”. After his death, his company was able to fulfill his dream and created the Puppet Museum of Porto (2013), where a lot of his creations are now showcased.

Regarding Abi Feijó, throughout his career he was able to found two animation studios, “Filmógrafo” (1987-2002) and “Ciclope” (2002-) where he was able to produce not only majority of his films, but also films from other remarkable Portuguese directors. “Filmógrafo” was created when Abi was developing “Time of Darkness” (1988) and during a time when there wasn’t any investment in Portuguese independent animation. While making “Outlaws”(1993), the studio obtained financial support and Abi was able to mentor many animators whose first films were produced by “Filmógrafo”. Among them, there was José Miguel Ribeiro and his film “The Egg” (1994), Pedro Serrazina and his film “The Tale About The Cat And The Moon” (1995) and Regina Pessoa and her film “The Night” (1999). Regina Pessoa and Abi Feijó still collaborate to this day, and her most recent film “Uncle Thomas: Accounting For the Days” (2019), a co-production between Portugal, France and Canada, has won awards in both Annecy and Annie Awards.

“Uncle Thomas: Accounting For The Days” directed by Regina Pessoa (2019)

Besides these animation studios, Abi has been able to mentor many other students of animation not only through “Cooperativa Árvore” but also in universities in Porto, like Universidade Católica and Escola Superior Artística do Porto. He founded “The Animation House” in 2001, a cultural centre that promotes and divulges the art of animation, as well as “Casa Museu de Vilar” in 2014 a small museum that exhibits “a collection of interactive objects from Pre-cinema”, as well as Feijó and Pessoa’s work and other international animators.

Final Thoughts

The “Carnation Revolution” is not just part of my country’s history it’s also part of my family’s history and similarly to these animators, I want to carry that legacy with the work that I do. As a queer, gender non-conforming person, a lot of the obstacles that I face in my country are caused by fear, anger and prejudice inherited from the dictatorship. I strongly believe that understanding that time and reflecting on the lessons learnt from the revolution through the arts and education, can prevent future generations from making the same mistakes.

Nowadays, I think there’s too much repetitive meaningless noise with the amount of digital media we consume and I think it’s important that visual content creators take accountability for that. Therefore, like Abi Feijó and Seara Cardoso, I’m not really interested in feeding that noise, by entertaining or distracting people from thinking. Instead, I would rather make them think!

DECENTRALIZED PROTAGONISM

Another element shared by both these directors is the perspective in which they tell their stories and the protagonists they choose to give the spotlight to. In Seara Cardoso‘s TV shows, at times it’s even hard to find a specific protagonist. With the exception of the title “Gaspar’s Friends”, Gaspar is not really given any more air time than his friends and neighbors. The same happens with the birds that live in the “Patafúrdios’ Tree” or the townspeople in the village of “Out of the Ark”. This highlights the importance of camaraderie and creates many opportunities for characters with different points of view to come to terms with each other, prioritizing a sense of community awareness instead of self-centered individualism in one character’s perspective.

In Abi Feijó‘s case, besides consistently using nameless characters, this ambiguity is also found in couple of his films. In both “Time of Darkness” and “Portuguese Fado”, since both films are poetic documentaries about Portuguese history, I would say “Portugal” is the protagonist. In the first, through the illustrator Abel Manta’s perspective of the dictatorship, and the second, through Feijó’s own critical perspective of Portuguese history. Even though in both the “Outlaws” and the “Stowaway” there is an evident protagonist, I would argue that there is a clear interest from Abi Feijó in authors that choose to give a less commonly seen spotlight. In the “Outlaws”, inspired by a tale from Jorge de Sena (“Os Grão-capitães” 1976), the driver who is introduced as a secondary character, soon becomes the narrator of the film and creates a sudden shift in the perspective of the story being told about a group of refugees from the Spanish Civil War. Whereas in “Stowaway”, inspired by a tale written by José Rodrigues Miguéis (“O natal do clandestino” 1957) we follow a character without a name, an origin nor a destination finding refuge in a foreign land

AUTHORITY FIGURE

In contrast to this, we can also find in their work authority figure characters, clearly reminiscent of the Portuguese authoritarian past. In Feijó‘s work, these characters exude an intimidating fear and seem to abuse their power and privilege. It can be seen more evidently in the “Outlaws” with the characters of the “Old Engineer” and the “Inspector”, as well as the many different representations of PIDE agents and state officials in “Time of Darkness”. Interestingly, the “Coast Guard” in “Stowaway” is introduced as an authority figure through the fears of the protagonist, ending up compassionately helping him on a Christmas Eve.

In Seara Cardoso‘s case, these authority figures play an equally important role on his shows, but have a much more humorous sentiment to them and overall, their power and close-minded views tend to be questioned and refuted by the rest of the characters. The ones that stand out the most are “Guard Serôdio” from “Gaspar’s Friends”, who comes up with a new rule every episode to interfere with the characters’ plans, and also the “Great Chief” from “Out of the Ark” who constantly tries to find ways to either exploit his villagers or to attack the neighboring barbarians. Despite of that, these characters are never really vilified or ostracized, finding a way to compromise and remaining a fundamental part of respective communities.

Even though their work is aesthetically very different, they have a few interesting things in common. They are both from the north of Portugal, (Abi Feijó from Braga and Seara Cardoso from Porto), they were both born in 1956 and majority of their animation work was also done in the mid 80’s and early 90’s. As a result, they represent a generation that used their recently obtained freedom of speech to express a civic conscience inherited from the Carnation Revolution. While analyzing, I found in both of their work, elements that define this “Portuguese Intervention” movement.

MUSIC

Probably the most characteristic element, the music played an instrumental role in both of their works. In Portugal, after and, especially, before the Carnation revolution, music was definitely the most active art form of the “Intervention” movement. Most of these musicians were only able to create abroad, in fear of being persecuted and tortured by PIDE and the state, and on the night of the revolution it was the radio-broadcast of “Grândola, Vila Morena” (1971), by Zeca Afonso, that was used as signal to the MFA troops across the country to initiate the military coup. This type of music is known for using traditional Portuguese instruments (or simply a capella); for being associated to (or sung by) hard labor groups, like the miners and farming jobs; for using lyrics and poetry that promoted unified action against the regime and uplifted the working class; and for being censored by the regime.

Interestingly, fragments of “Grândola, Vila Morena” can be found in Abi Feijó‘s “A Noite Saiu à Rua” (1988) (Time of Darkness), a film that depicts the Estado Novo. Through “Oh Que Calma” (1985) (How Calm It Is), Abi uses music to approach traditional Portuguese culture, by giving life to a song traditionally played by female wheat reapers in Beira Baixa, Portugal (“oh que calma vai caindo” from the album “Vai de roda”(1983)). For the rest of his films (and his animation studio “Filmógrafo”), Abi collaborates with Manuel Tentúgal to create the music which “establishes a dialogue (with the viewer) on an equal footing with the image” (Feijó, 2001).

In Seara Cardoso‘s TV shows, music is perhaps the most memorable aspect. To this day, the generations that grew up watching his shows still remember the lyrics of some of the songs, especially ” Por Incrível Que Pareça” from “A Árvore dos Patafúrdios” (The Patafúrdios’ Tree) and “É tão bom” from “Amigos do Gaspar” (Gaspar’s Friends). On each episode, there was at least one original song sung by the characters, making his shows essentially musicals. These songs were written by Sérgio Godinho and composed by Jorge Constante Pereira. Sérgio Godinho is as well a prominent “Intervention” musician whose social awareness is very present through the music of the show.

HANDCRAFTMANSHIP

Seara Cardoso and Abi Feijó both shared a curiosity and admiration for craftsmanship in their creative process. Their animation styles value the process of building characters and sets or manipulating materials, as much as the story itself. Seara Cardoso approaches his animation from a traditional handcraftsmanship background, referencing, not only Dom Roberto Theatre puppetry, but also the traditional ceramics from Minho, as seen in the conceptualization of “No Tempo dos Afonsinhos” (1993)(Out Of The Ark), which takes place in that area. This particular show portraits a castro village from the Bronze-age period and also gives a lot emphasis to the craftsmanship associated to the traditional jobs that many members of that village have, including the baker, weaver, potter and washerwoman.

In Abi Feijó‘s case, this “handcraftmanship” can be seen on the animation techniques he uses to create his films. On his first film, “Oh Que Calma!” (1985), he used 8 different types: pinscreen, paint-on-film, hand drawn, clay, cutout, photocopies, crayon and sand animation. Throughout his career, he tends to use sand animation and cutout the most. With sand animation, he’s able to take advantage of the fluidity and the texture of the material, which seems to combine perfectly with the poetic nature and of “Oh Que Calma!”, as well as the rusty aspect of the ship and the harbour in “Clandestino” (2000)(Stowaway). With cutout animation, he’s able to give life to already existing work, like the political illustrations and caricatures of João Abel Manta in “A Noite Saiu À Rua” (1988) (Time of Darkness), as well as historical illustrations and Portuguese art in “Fado Lusitano” (1994)(Portuguese Fado).

In 1977, Abi Feijó was a Fine Arts student in Porto when he discovered animation through CINANIMA’s first editions. During that time he came across alternative, poetic and experimental animation films that still constitute some of his biggest references today. Among those include: Co Hoedman’s stop-motion fim “The Sand Castle” (1977); Jacques Drouin’s pinscreen animation “Mindscape” (1976); Caroline Leaf’s paint-on-glass animation “The Street” (1976); Paul Driessen’s “David” (1977) and “The Killing of an Egg” (1977).

As a student, Abi was initially interested in using comic books as his artistic medium, but through these films he met animation as a legitimate art form and started experimenting straight away. In its second edition, CINANIMA started providing workshops with the animator Gaston Roch and the french collective “Collodion Humide”, where Abi “saw the animation secrets being unveiled”. In 1980, Abi started to develop another important aspect of his career, the pedagogical side. He started teaching animation workshops for 16 year-olds, through Cooperativa Árvore, which would take place after CINANIMA. In 1985, this organization also created an animation course for children called “Arbusto”, where Abi also taught. These films ended up in animation festivals like Annecy and Juvecine, the latter awarding an honorable mention to Abi in 1987, for his contribution in this studio.

In 1984, Abi had the opportunity to do an internship in Montreal at the National Film Board of Canada’s studios (NFB) with Pierre Hébert. There, he experimented with many animation techniques to direct his first short film “Oh Que Calma!”(1985) (How Calm It Is), where he used 8 different types: pinscreen, paint-on-film, hand drawn, clay, cutout, photocopies, crayon and sand animation. In this film, Abi uses music to approach traditional Portuguese culture, by animating a song traditionally played by female wheat reapers in Beira Baixa, Portugal (“oh que calma vai caindo” from the album “Vai de roda”(1983)).

Interestingly enough, João Paulo Seara Cardoso and Abi Feijó were both born in 1956 and both are from the north of Portugal. Abi is from Braga and Seara Cardoso from Porto and they actually met for the first time when they were only teenagers. But in Seara Cardoso’s case, his connection with animated characters started with building them instead of drawing them. In fact, that same interest for construction lead him to pursue mechanical engineering at university, where he started attending University Theatre of Porto and later joined the Intervention Amateur Theatre, contributing mainly for the set design . 1979 was proclaimed by UNESCO The International Year of the Child and as a result, Seara Cardoso was involved in many child plays for children of every background – an experience that he described as “a fantastic cultural democratization”.

It was when he joined the Support Fund for Youth Organizations (FAOJ) in 1980 as a cultural entertainer, that he fell in love with Portuguese traditional theatre from all over the country, including Festa dos Rapazes, Festa da Bugiada, Serração da Velha, but especially Dom Roberto theatre. At that time, he met the ethnologist Ernesto Veiga de Oliveira and António Dias, one of the last puppeteers of “Robertos”. Seara Cardoso became his apprentice, and after his death, he dedicated the following years wandering around the country recreating and showcasing his own Dom Roberto puppets.

Later on, Seara Cardoso had the opportunity to study at Institut National d’Éducation Populaire where he learnt from Marcel Violette and Lopez Barrantez. Afterwards in Porto, he was able to showcase his own puppet theatre regularly in “Realejo”, where a TV producer from the Portuguese public network, RTP, saw him for the first time and invited him to create a TV show for children – “A Ávore dos Patafúrdios” (1985). This show gave Seara Cardoso the opportunity to do a course with Jim Henson at the Institut International de la Marionette, who was apparently impressed by his naïf style.