Animator Profile

Ladislaw Starewicz

Ladislaw Starewicz (1892-1965) Starewicz was a 3D stop motion animator or as he called it, puppet animator. His work was mainly aimed for children of his time, though would now be seen and considered strange to be showing his kind of animation to children. If nothing else it would case nightmares for the parents if not the child. His very crude but well thought out animation where never the less, very good.

Ladislaw Starewicz animator carear started while he worked at the Museum of Natural History in Konvo. He used the museum as a sort of playground, making four short films while he was working there. Starewicz found inspiration to make a film with two beetles, but found it difficult when the beetles would fall asleep under the lights instead of fighting like he wanted. It was here that he first dabbled in stop-motion animation. He created puppets out of the beetles and staged their fight, filming it frame by frame. (Mahar, 2010) When he returned to Moscow he would continue this form of animation, using dead animals to create his work. One could say he fell into animation or animation fell on top of him as he would then devote the rest of his life to animation and would become the blue print to many animators of today.

The Mascot is one of his more creepier films and, even though was meant for children, has a nightmare factor that would never be allowed to be shown to today's children. Considering its strong correspondences to more recent films such as The Nightmare Before Christmas and Toy Story, it is not surprising that The Mascot has been one of Starewiczs most widely seen and distributed films (particularly in the United States). Nevertheless, Starewicz is generally an underappreciated figure in film, and more specifically, animation history. ( Danks, 2004) Even though he is under-appreciated and a lot of his work has a lot of the creep factor one cannot help but admire his work , The Mascot being one of them.

Bibliography
Mahar. K, Ladislas Starewicz Biography, 2010 [online] At: http://people.wcsu.edu/mccarneyh/fva/S/StarewiczL_bio.html (accessed 3-4-12) Danks. A, Senses OF Cinema, 2004 [online image] At: http://www.sensesofcinema.com/2004/cteq/starewicz_mascot/ (accessed 3-4-12)

Illustrations
Figure one. Ladislaw Starewicz [online image] At: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/75/Starevich_1.jpg/220pxStarevich_1.jpg (accessed 3-4-12) Figure two. The Mascot [online image] At: http://www.sensesofcinema.com/wpcontent/uploads/images/04/cteq/the_mascot.jpg (accessed 3-4-12)