CalArts just hosted an amazing centennial celebration in honor of my mentor Jules Engel on Saturday April 15th 2009 .  I was lucky enough to be among the panel of former students who were invited to discuss how they were influenced by Jules Engel’s legacy.   Engel’s distinguished career included an amazing body of personal abstract films and fine art as well as story and color work on Disney classics “Fantasia” and “Bambi.” He also  was one of the founding members of UPA, the studio that created Mr. Magoo and Gerald McBoing Boing, where he was responsible for color, design and layout.  Engel founded the CalArts Experimental Animation program in 1969 and had an extensive career as a teacher and mentor with untold amounts of influence on the animation universe. Jules passed away in 2003 at the age of 95, but his spirit lives on as proved by this powerful and moving evening of reminiscing about his influence.  It was amazing to hear from everyone.

The other speakers at the event included; Jorge Gutierrez, creator of El Tigre (who opened the panel with some side splitting stories of his experiences with Jules), Steve Hillenburg, creator of SpongeBob SquarePants (who showed an amazing personal film from 1991 where he drew one frame a day for an entire year), Mark Kirkland, director on The Simpsons (who showed tons of amazing examples of Jules work and how it directly related to his own), Joanna Priestley, independent animator (who showed her brand new film MISSED ACHES in honor of Jules) and Henry Selick, director of Coraline, The Nightmare Before Christmas (who shared that Jules was the one who showed him the works of Jan Svankmeyer and Jiri Trnka sending him down his path of fascination with creepy stop-motion).  All in all is was an amazing night.  Special thanks to Courtney McIntyre for organizing the entire event.

L-R Henry Sellick, Stephen Hillenburg, Sahar Alsawaf, Mark Kirkland, Johanna Priestley, Janeann Dill, me, and Jorge Gutierrez.

Here’s an excerpt from the AWN.com article I wrote recently, “Remembering Jules Engel”;

(April 16, 2009)  In the fall of 1990, I transferred into the Experimental Animation department at CalArts after studying foundation art at Pratt Institute in New York. I had a sense that I was entering into a unique program. Judging from the work on the walls, I knew this was a place where special and interesting things had happened in the past. Walking around the room, I could see interesting work in progress on every desk. It wasn’t until I started taking classes that year, however, that I truly understood that the foundation for all of the work I saw was in large part due to the amazingly supportive environment that was created for these students by my mentor Jules Engel.

To read entire article on AWN.com, click HERE

To read fellow panelist Jorge Gutierriez’s Blog about Jules, click HERE

Or to find out more or make a donation to the CalArts Jules Engel Scholarship Fund get in touch with Courtney McIntyre at 661 222-2743 or at cmcintyr@calarts.edu.