Animated Jams: the Secret Joy of Collective Films

Abstract

[EN] This article presents an overview on a rare genre from independent animation, the animated `jams¿ or collective films, where all invited authors are free to contribute creatively to the ensemble. Animated `jams¿ have, therefore, a great power to free the imagination, so that the results are virtually unrepeatable by another group of animators, much less through a planned work system. Therefore, animated `jams¿ stimulate innovation, leading to experimental films that achieve notoriety at cinema and animation festivals because of their originality. Musicality, absurd humour, improvisation and abstraction are common features of these art films, where any narrative will remain in the background. Several examples of this unusual genre are discussed, from Marv Newland¿s bold proposal to produce the film Anijam (Newland, 1984) ¿ which shows a strong influence of the surrealistic `exquisite corpse¿ ¿ to learning experiences using the animated `jam¿ as a strategy to introduce students to animation, often coordinated by renowned animators who share their techniques and procedures in the workshops. The article will also pay attention to a singular figure, Dr Miquel Guillem, who significantly supported the realization of animated `jams¿ at Universitat Politècnica de València, as a teaching methodology that promotes collective work. Furthermore, this article will gather first-hand the production process of one of these `jams¿: The Cat Dances with its Shadow (Lorenzo, 2012).