Experimental Animation Shines in Annecy Contrechamp Title ‘Journey of Shadows’: ‘I Understand Animation as a Model to Reflect Ourselves’

variety.com:

Holly Jones The minimal and subliminal converge in Swiss artist Yves Netzhammer‘s Annecy Contrechamp title “Journey of Shadows” (“Reise der Schatten”).

Netzhammer, who made his feature debut with “Journey,” is well known for his work in sculpture, animation, mixed-media and video, all of which informed his animated project and abstract rendering of the human condition. “I’ve developed many animation works for installations over the last few years.

In the process, a kind of visual vocabulary with human figures, animals and objects has emerged,” Netzhammer told Variety. “My feature focuses on the narrative structure, which, on the one hand, follows cinematic rules, but on the other hand, functions in a circular way due to my associative visual language and allows us to think of many things, both personal and collective.

My characters are given an identity through this feature film,” he added. Produced by Stella Händler at Freihändler Filmproduktion GMBH and Jolanda Gsponer a Liechti Filmproduktion, who also handle world sales rights, alongside Gabriela Bloch Steinmann and SRF Schweizer Radio und Fernsehen, the film sets up three main figures on screen, two mannequin-styled forms managing a tumultuous romantic relationship through bouts of self-reflection, and a simian companion.