Open Lecture: Paul Ward
The presentation will deal with specific issues to do with the growth of a research culture in the field of Animation theory and practice. The ‘pipeline’ metaphor, derived from a term used in production, most obviously offers a way into thinking about how research around Animation might be produced, organised and disseminated. But it also emphasises that all stages of the Animation process – from pre-production, through production, to post-production, extending backwards (with archive work) or forwards (with Research & Development projects into technological innovations), and including student production work and research – should be part of the overall research procedure.
The presentation will also talk more generally about how research is framed and inflected (and, some would argue, distorted) by the double binds and contradictions of building a research culture, using John Caldwell’s ‘production culture’ paradigm as a model for further reflection.
Dr. Paul Ward is Professor of Animation Studies at the Arts University Bournemouth, UK. He is Course Leader for MA Animation Production, teaches on the BA (Hons) Animation Production course and supervises PhD students. His research interests are in the fields of animation and documentary film and television. Published work includes articles for the journals animation: an interdisciplinary journal, Animation Journal, and the Historical Journal for Film, Radio and Television, as well as numerous anthology essays. He is the author of Documentary: The Margins of Reality (Wallflower Press, 2005) and TV Genres: Animation (Edinburgh University Press, forthcoming; co-authored with Nichola Dobson). He has presented invited papers and keynotes in London, Edinburgh, Basel, Utrecht, and Copenhagen, and his work has been translated into Czech, German and Japanese. He serves on the Editorial Boards of animation: an interdisciplinary journal and Animation Studies and is a member of the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council Peer Review College with special interest in animation and documentary research proposals. Professor Ward is the current President of the Society for Animation Studies