Animayo Awards Oscar-Qualifying Honors to Iran’s ‘Our Uniform’ and Spain’s ‘Amarradas’ Amid a 29% Jump in Attendance
Anna Marie de la Fuente Spain’s foremost animation film festival, Animayo Gran Canaria, awarded Oscar-qualifying honors to animation shorts “Our Uniform” by Iran’s Yegane Moghaddam and “Amarradas” by Spain’s Carmen Córdoba as it reported a 29% jump in attendance, the biggest ever in its 18-year history. Sixty animation shorts were in contention, selected out of 2,000 entries from more than 80 countries. Disney animation legend Andreas Deja (“The Lion King,” “Aladdin”), who presented the Spanish premiere of his 2D animation short, “Mushka,” presided over the international jury. He also held a Master Class on his 30 years at Disney, delivered a keynote address on the making of “Mushka” and led a three-hour drawing class on animated villains. “The students made me feel like a rock star,” he told Variety. “What better thing to hear than that the films I worked on still impact many people to this day,” he mused.