Annecy is getting the full LAIKA treatment this year.
The Annecy International Animation Film Festival will be visited by LAIKA, the Portland, Oregon-based stop-motion animation studio behind such hits as “Coraline,” “ParaNorman” and “Kubo and the Two Strings.” The studio will unveil a new exhibition themed to its forthcoming fantasy epic “Wildwood,” with a special appearance by “Wildwood” director (and head of LAIKA) Travis Knight. Knight will be visiting Annecy for the first time.
The exhibition, “Wildwood: Discovering a Handcrafted World,” will be on display at Galerie de la Cité until Sept. 27. “Between educational discovery and sensory experience, this exhibition offers the public a rare opportunity to explore behind the scenes of LAIKA’s most ambitious world to date,” according to the official release.
“Wildwood is the biggest universe LAIKA has ever created, and the most personal,” Knight said. “It speaks to us about the allure of the unknown, the courage it takes to venture into it, and the transformation one undergoes along the way. Our film celebrates the primacy of art over algorithms and the belief that films made by hand, with meticulous care, can still be bold, surprising, dangerous and alive.”
Among the highlights of the exhibition are a miniature set inspired by Pittock Mansion (a key location in the film) and the General (voiced in the film by Angela Bassett), “one of the largest puppets ever created by LAIKA, measures 86 cm from beak to tail and has a wingspan of 163 cm.” The puppet on display “is adorned with 3,794 feathers, each individually positioned, themselves taken from a batch of over 16,500 feathers cut during production.” The character, a breakthrough for the studio, is the first LAIKA puppet to feature fully articulated wings, “designed to open and fold like those of a real bird.”
The exhibition will mark the beginning of the global rollout of “Wildwood” by LAIKA. The film opens in the United States, via Fathom Entertainment, on Oct. 23. Because LAIKA and Halloween just go together.
“We are particularly proud to welcome LAIKA to Annecy for the opening of the International City of Animated Film,” Mickaël Marin, CEO of CITIA, said. “Their work embodies a rare, demanding and profoundly artisanal vision of cinema. The presence of Travis Knight, for the first time in Annecy, gives this moment a very special resonance. It is an honor to open this new chapter alongside a filmmaker whose artistic commitment is as strong as it is unique.”
He continued: “Presented exclusively in Annecy, this exhibition is one of the very first experiences offered to the public within the City. It reflects our ambition: to offer direct access to the creative process, the techniques, the know-how, to what constitutes the very essence of the works.”
