Q U I C K D R A W A N I M AT I O N S O C I E T Y

pre se nts

ON
LGBTQ2S+
AN I MATI O N
 P R E FAC E 3

1 | N O R T H A M E R I C A N P O P U L A R A N I M AT I O N 7

R E P R E S E N TAT I O N S O F Q U E E R N E S S 9
I N A N I M AT I O N
M AY G N 21

S E I Z U R E O F R E P R E S E N TAT I O N B Y H O S T I L E M E A N S , 22
A MINI-FESTO
COLIN GALL ANT 25

1 | FILMS SCR EENED 26

2 | A Q U E E R H I S T O R Y O F C A N A D I A N A N I M AT I O N 31

L O O K I N G I N T O T H E PA S T: 33
20 Years of Canadian Queer Auto/Biographical Animation
SAM DECOSTE 44

FORMING 46
JILLIAN FLECK 48

2 | FILMS SCR EENED 49

3 | B E YO N D N O R T H A M E R I C A N A N I M AT I O N 55

BISEX UA LI T Y & T H E A DOLESCE NCE OF U T E NA 57

K R I S T E N H U TC H I N S O N 66

N O L I M I TAT I O N S : 67
The In herent Queer ness of A nimation
A M I A YO KOYA M A 69

3 | FILM SCR EENED 70

4 | F U T U R E O F Q U E E R A N I M AT I O N 75

WA I T I N G O N T H E R E N D E R : 77
Contemporar y LGBTQ2S+ A nimators and the
Fu t u r e o f Q u e e r A n i m a t i o n
SAM GURRY 89

M A R I A S TO I A N 90
SAILOR'S OUT 92

ABBE Y BENNET T 94
IN BETWEEN 96

MIKE HOOVES 98
HYBRIDITY 100

LY N D O N N AVA LTA 102

T R A N S L AT E / T R A N S F O R M 104

4 | FILMS SCR EENED 106

THANKS 107
Z I N E CO M M I T T E E 108
Q U I C K D R AW A N I M AT I O N S O C I E T Y 110
2
 PR EFACE

This collection of essays, comics, and other works

is not meant to be a comprehensive picture of the
past and present state of queer animation. When we
began this project, it was immediately clear the gap in
the literature was far too big for any one publication
to fill, especially one as modest as this. What “On
LGBTQ2S+ Animation” is, then, is a conversation
starter, a place where artists, animators and critical
writers can explore topics of queerness, identity and 3
representation in animation from a variety of angles.

Reading these essays and presenting a screening

series to go with it has been an enlightening process
for us, and we hope it is for you, too. Like the films
they discuss, these pieces are cathartic, critical,
celebratory and caustic. They are honest, exploratory
and inspiring—and we hope they will lead to more
writing, more creation, and more understanding of
the important contributions that queer creators have
made, and will continue to make, to the medium
of animation.

Quickdraw Animation Society

4
 N O RT H A M E R I C A N P O P U LAR
AN I MAT I O N

1
6
 1
On LGBTQ2S+ Animation is a four-part screening
and essay series commisioned by the Quickdraw
Animation Society, a Calgary-based artist-run centre
dedicated to the art of animation. With this series,
we've reached out to artists and writers from the queer
community to explore the role of LGBTQ+ artists and 7

subjects throughout animation, to spotlight artists,

stories and perspectives that have traditionally been
under-exposed.

The essays we've received range from the personal

to the political, historical and contemporary. We
hope they provoke insight and awareness, and
that they may prompt similar projects from other
artists and writers. Animation is a rich, diverse
medium, and the stories and contributions of the
queer community extend far beyond what we can
capture in a few short essays—but we hope you enjoy
the attempt.

Lyndon Navalta
8
 REPRESENTATIONS OF
Q U EERNESS IN ANIM AT IO N
Ma y G N

This essay and accompanying film screening aim to build an

understanding of the queer experience through a selection
of animated depictions of the LGBTQ2S+ mode of being.
Each of these films is worthy of a text in and of itself, each 9
speaking to the manifold qualities of being queer, staying
alive and finding love. Many of these works are available
online, and so it’s my hope that this text lives on as a
companion guide to those works, and you can glean your
own understandings of queer people and the animations
they strive to make.

This text covers the act of coming out, the nature of queer
pain, the abstract parts of queerness, and ultimately
hopes to build an understanding of queer love through
the animated medium. This endeavour of categorization
is perhaps a bit futile, and you won’t catch me calling it
an exhaustive effort. In this short span of words, I think
I’ve developed the possibility for something beyond a
surface level of understanding for the queer subject in
animation, the motivations of its filmmakers, and its origin
in popular animated productions. The complexities of this
task are without number, but I assure you the rewards
are worthwhile.
 What I can do is chalk my failure up to the utterly inexhaustible nature
of LGBTQ2S+ output when it comes to telling our own stories. I simply
can’t keep up with such a generous fountain of integral animated
excellence, is all.

Reading Between Straight Lines

In writing about representations of queerness in animated work, I

feel the need to cite an origin point; a place where, at least from my
North American experience, this queer presence found a popular
foothold and perhaps grew from. This popular grounding is essential to
connecting to the world where the queer filmmakers I want to discuss
come from. When we create that foothold using the term origin, we
can finally begin to discuss more contemporary understandings of
queer representation that exceed the more implicit representations
of the past without limiting ourselves to any strict canon. If this tends
to look like a history, I encourage you to notice the conspicuous gaps,
10
the conveniently Westernized nature of this foreword and compare
it with the high variance of works discussed in this essay. We’re
establishing a mindset.

This is where I have chosen to talk about Bugs Bunny. The wascally
wabbit as gender bender is a well understood concept in the Looney
Tunes animated catalog. Ru Paul of Drag Race fame is on record
testifying for Bugs Bunny as his first exposure to drag. Though not
my own explicit queer animated incitement point, this utilization of
Bugs as a jumping off point is suitably North American.

A small case study: In What’s Opera, Doc? we have Bugs, sought by

Elmer “Sigfried” Fudd, threatened with death by spear and magic
helmet. Bugs runs for a time until ducking out of sight, in a retaliatory
move donning a golden bodice, tunic and winged helmet, becoming the
high warrior femme Valkyrie Bugs-hilde. It must be noted, though, that
just as importantly to our purposes, they also apply purple eyeshadow,
lashes and a blond pig-tailed wig. What can be noted is that Bugs is
as likely to kiss their attacker as run away. I am admittedly a touch
biased and invested and would like to take this further: I’d propose
Bugs’ change of clothes is more a shift in modes of being as opposed
to a mere disguise. For myself, this Bunny is trans. The key to any
origin of queer representation in animation is the all-important act
of reading between straight lines.

Early Exposure

Many characters I had been exposed to as a child had their sexuality

relegated to the category of the implicit, with queerness being
an inexplicit but underlying quality of those figures. The Disney
animated catalogue has a plethora of ambigulously queer characters,
such as Scar and Ursula from The Lion King and The Little Mermaid
respectively, or Cogsworth and Lumier, the lovingly bickering
clock and candlestick couple from Beauty and the Beast. Adult
primetime television had a more head-on approach to depicting
queer characters with The Simpsons leading the pack with comedic
11
but genuinely kind and fleshed out depictions of gay characters
during its earlier run.

There is something to be said about the villainous/disparaging streak

in queer-coded characters. Not every animated work I was exposed
was so considered, and a fair portion of my earliest experience with
explicitly queer characterization was through latenight adult comedic
programming. South Park’s centrist we-make-fun-of-everyone brand
of cowardice saw multiple atrocious, cartoonish representations of gay
and transgendered people. Ambiguously gay villains were also part
and parcel with children's animated works, with the aformentioned
Scar and Ursula the sea witch as obvious examples.

It wasn’t all bad, though. My first moment of queer awakening in

animation was probably seeing the tacitly transgendered villainous
character HIM from The Powerpuff Girls. Something about HIM
still clicks with me to this day. The alleged threat of HIM’s fabulous
insidiousness was inspirational. He felt like a true threat to the
 “sugar, spice, and everything nice” aspects of the Powerpuff Girls.
It made sense that a show that starts with a gendered anthem would
have a villain who crossed gendered boundaries. The eponymous
SpongeBob SquarePants has become a queer icon for many western
youth, and throughout the ’90s and ’00s there were multiple queer
coded characters finding their way into animated works in North
America, though limited in the scope of their depictions and often
penned by straight creators.

The Tenuous Present and Why We’re Here

Ultimately, this leads us, after some time and a patchy history, to the
deliberate presence of the uncloseted Queer Author. Its poster-child
in TV animation, Rebecca Sugar, led the pack with pushes for queer
representation in her work on seminal television show Adventure
Time, with the initially coded but gradually more explicit relationship
of Marceline the Vampire Queen and Princess Bubblegum. Sugar’s
12
work began its blossoming in 2011 with the advent of Steven Universe
and its intersection with Tumblr as a site for gay organization and
cultural development, with its production environment giving rise
to multiple queer creators developing their own animated televised
efforts. Queer stories and queer characters are more often than
ever penned by queer creators and recieved by wider audiences
than ever thought possible. Most recently, Steven Universe alumnus
Noelle Stevenson has been tasked with re-imagining ’80s cult
cartoon She-Ra and the Princesses of Power. Stevenson presents
a galaxy where any gender can be a princess, where being queer
is the norm, and where positivity eclipses darkness.

The act of locating and defining familiar sites (both past and present)
for queerness being represented in animation is important for us to
perhaps gain an understanding of where some of the inspirational
material for this program’s chosen selection issues from. That said,
this is nowhere near a complete picture of what queer representation
actually is. What we can do now, after this short background is
 delve into a deeper understanding of our topic of representation:
the representation of queer experience as the thing in and of itself.

Heroism

To start, I’d like to make clear the triumph of the queer works
on view for us now: these works required the bravery to expose
one’s queerness to the world. To be clear, one's queerness is not
reliant on one's coming out. Some find the danger to their health
and wellbeing that opening themselves up presents is too great a
risk. Works like the ones featured in this essay and screening program
are created by those with the means and capability to be out in the
open to bolster others in the same situation. Without these creators
being out, without their authorial hand, these works wouldn’t exist.

13
Queer Heroes | Kate Jessop | 2016

Directed by Kate Jessop's Animation Girl Band, Queer Heroes sees

14 animators bleed their works into one another to depict the lives
of queer figures, often operating in defiance of cultural, political and
social oppression. The film honours the courage behind LGBTQ2s+
experience and history. Bravery in coming out, though easy to
characterize as simply liberating, has to come with an understanding
of its inherent anxiety.
 Dating Sucks: A Genderqueer Misadventure, by Sam Berliner, gives us
a moment-to-moment account of a transgendered dating experience,
its awkwardness and fear of rejection rendering the world a confusing
mess of communication. Igor Coric and Sheldon Liberman's Teagan,
and Roscoe Rappaport's Out both offer a common template for queer
creation, one that often exceeds its medium: the autobiography.

Teagan | Igor Coric, Sheldon Liberman | 2016

14

An early and integral discovery to make when taking in these works

is that much if not all of their material comes from mediating the
lived experiences of their creators. There is enough of a disparate
nature to these experiences, lives and animations that I would like to
highlight a solid, and I think undeniable connection: these differences
stem from inside the animator, and what unites them is their desire
to capture it and show it to others who can relate to it.

Pain

Content Warning: this next part involves physical violence against trans
people, suicide, mental illness, and heartbreak.

Pain is a facet of the queer experience that can be caustic, driving

the feelings of otherness and exclusion that haunt the LGBTQ2S+
experience to its steepest degrees. Queer pain is tireless in its work
 to isolate and hinder the growth of its subject. The sites of queer pain
are less easy to pin down than its effects: The family, interpersonal
relationships, social interactions—these are likely sites where queer
pain issues from, but there are others. Queer pain, insidiously enough,
also exists in the hypothetical, the seemingly impossible, and the
unknowable future. The works discussed here are the ones I see as
a memorial to the damage already done, a catharsis to those who’ve
suffered, and a vaccine against this fearful future.

Charlie (formerly Anna) Ngo's Dissonance deals with the terrible,

unknown potential of the queer experience. The desire to become
what you are, and not what others demand you be fuels this work but,
instead of triumphant, Dissonance is violent. This had been my fear
when I was walking through my college train station in a dress for the
first time with my cis-het friend as he pointed out how much attention
I was getting. I felt then the danger that Dissonance portrays: what
if someone comes for me? A similar but softer kind of heartbreak
15
can be seen in José Manuel Silvestre's Huellas, the story of a child’s
shadow clopping around haphazardly in their mother’s shoes, playing
with her necklace until their father comes home with a different set
of expectations. The shadowy indents of hastily discarded high heels
leave a mark that lasts into the future.
Dissonance | Charlie (formerly Anna) Ngo | 2015
 Aquarium | Yonatan Tal | 2015
Yonatan Tal's Aquarium is quieter, an altogether more somber
depiction of the pain between two queer people. This is the pain of
questioning one’s identity and giving in to the pressure of the public
16 eye. In Goodbye Forever Party, animator Jonni Phillips dives deep
inside of another propagator of queer pain: the presence of mental
illness. A common companion of queer people, Goodbye Forever Party
investigates the fatalism that can grow to overwhelm and collapse
your life when your mind is clouded and you don’t understand why.

The final works of this segment belong to members of French school

Gobelins, with a film whose synopsis reads: “In a kitchen, a mother
and a child struggle to establish dialogue.” Kelsi Phung’s work
Les lèvres gercées addresses how we can experience the failure of our
families. A study in the carelessness and wilful misunderstanding of
family, lèvres depicts that kind of cruelty in sharp relief. The abuse
our subject endures is pervasive, issuing from a place that should
be safe. Sometimes queer pain is inflicted casually, and often by
the people that should love us the most. Shudo, a dramatic duel to
the death between master and apprentice, conveys that pain with
gravity. Mayhem mingles with lost love and stands in testament to
how we can hurt each other. I’d like to think these works mimic the
pain of rejection.
Hugo Weiss | 2015
Shudo | To-Anh Bach, Charles Badiller,

Abstraction

Queerness is often strange, explosive, catalytic and volatile. Queerness

grapples with voids, priming volcanic eruptions while dancing under 17
the album covers of its favourite singers. Queerness can be found in the
strange geometry of a low-rent, barred-window basement apartment
late at night. Some aspects of queerness require expressions outside
of the expected, to come to grips with what cannot be understood
in concrete terms, and for that queerness abducts and repurposes
abstraction.

蓮花燈 Lotus Lantern takes on the serene quality of bronze bells

ringing out in the wisteria-coloured home of filmmaker Calvin
Xingpei Shen. What’s on display here is the nature of queer dreams,
uncovering layers of the self and a specific past in an effort to provide
a connection where there wasn’t one before. Lantern might be about
ascension, the revolving, reciprocal nature of a queer identity. I’m
unsure. I cannot divine everything that Lantern presents, but I can
tell you that it is at the very least personal, and that it exists just
beyond the shadow of a mirror.
 蓮花燈 Lotus Lantern | Calvin Xingpei Shen | 2017
On the scale opposite to serenity, ADORABLE rips just about everything
open and poses itself to fully grasp the idea of liberation. Childlike in
its styling, composed of spastic and fluctuating geometry, masc figures
undulate and copulate on screen, become pool balls, careen, refract
18
lasers, splatter, revolve, get ripped, sit down, race and decapitate one
another, among other activities. This film acts as an ode of sorts to
LGBTQ2S+ club-kid sexual exploration by way of endless fractalization
and drag antics.

These works, despite abstraction, are all still based on personal

experience and a thoughtful, reflective method, though these films try
to reach as far beyond material matters as possible. This overreach
into abstraction could be the shape of queerness beyond the confined
mediation of heterosexual convention (or convention at all). Could
queer creation be the cataclysmic site of new conventions, or will it
always strive for the amorphous, serenely detached, or transcendant?

Love

Being based out of wildly differing bodies, lifestyles and sexualities,

queer love has a polymorphic quality that allows it to expand and fill
all niches of experience. Queer love is generous and flexible, risky and
 terrifying. The films discussed in this segment were chosen for the
particular strength in voicing this understanding of queer love, its
jubilant qualities, and its resiliency. However, I think it’s worthwhile
to draw attention to the conceit of this text and its limitations: the
concerns of queer love undergird most of the selected work. I would
feel secure posing the subject of love and its representation as the
chief concern of queer media.

This segment also holds a minor confession: as we reach the end of

this text and an analysis of queer representation, I have fallen into a
non-trivial level of self indulgence. I love the voices that have been
given to the triumph, pain and the unknowable aspects of the queer
experience contained herein. I want to give each work and facet of
representation its due, and this love for these expressions drives that.
Erika & Anju | Clara Horst | 2016

19

Erika & Anju is Clara Horst's tremendously earnest look into how the
presence of mental illness is not incompatible with recieving and
giving queer love. Posing the relationship of our titular characters
as a structure that can receive and process invisible trauma, the film
allows for a nuanced depiction of intrusive thoughts. As well, Erika
is not a simple victim of their mind, but operates alongside their
thoughts in a managerial role. For their part, Anju readily avoids
codependency in subtle and meaningful ways, providing Erika with
 opportunities to grow while being mindful of their lived experiences
and developing trust. That’s queer love.

uuuuuu by David Delafuente struck me as a perfect rendering of the

longing queer gaze. The film’s picture plane passes over as a distant
scanner, wandering and flickering over the rotoscoped makeout session
of two lovers. Focusing with utmost care and precision on the ears,
mouths, and hands of its subjects, uuuuuu denies the abstract and
ventures into the bodily, the specific. This film is a depiction of the
fidelity with which queer love in its precious rarity can be actualized
and experienced.

The final work in this colletion is a breather as well as a music video to

the St. Vincent song “And Then She Kissed Me”. A fast-forwarded look
through the budding life and love of two QPOC, Alexia Khodanian's film
is a fuzzed-out pop punk riff on the endless surprise that characterizes
queer relationships. The moment of discovery of someone who
20
accepts you, the life that flourishes in front of you when it all works
out. It’s a deeply sentimental film, but this is why it has to come last
on my list. I’m deeply cheesy, I really dig romance, and I really like St.
Vincent. I’ve survived this long as a transgendered writer, and now
I’m subjecting you to a simple expression of preference as a reward
for all my hard work.
And Then Ske Kissed Me | Alexia Khodanian | 2016
A Conclusive Poem

This text too,

rendered inanimate,
except
by your readers eyes

has been a work of queer love

21

M AY G N

May G N is a transgendered artist and writer operating in Calgary,

Alberta. Graduating from the Alberta College of Art + Design (now
AUArts) in 2015, they have been practicing the written craft as an
interviewer, poet and essayist in Calgary's artist-run culture. Coming
from a background outside of animation, May's lens has been honed
in support of art and emerging artists. Driven by a tender desire to
give light to queer works, her style is elaborative, seeking to bring
clarity to the nuances of her chosen topic.
 SEIZURE OF REPRESENTATION BY
HOSTILE MEANS, A MINI-FESTO
Co l i n Gallant

Is your local presenter not offering space for queer

22
a nimation? Maybe t hey have a queer strea m of
programming, but in that disingenuous way rife with
masturbatory backpatting? In Boomer theor y, you
could “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” and put on a
DIY showcase or workshop. Then again, you could fight
back and hit them right where it hurts: their precious,
gaudy idols. Not only does it feel good, but when done
correctly, it is an effective way to seize visibility.

This is already happening in a headline-making way that

queer animators should take note of. We’ll start with an
example that feels yards away and work our way back.

Little more than a year ago, country music was an

unimaginable space for queers. Today, the genre is reaching
for revolution thanks to renegades like Lil Nas X, Trixie
Mattel and Orville Peck. The three are using one of queer
people’s greatest weapons—camp—to simultaneously
skewer and breathe life into country. In a changing world,
country can’t and shouldn’t survive on “traditional” ideals, poser odes
to whiskey or the mechanical constraints of Nashville. Throwing rap,
drag and indie rock at country makes it more interesting, as do creators
of broader identities. And it’s working: an oppressive medium once
worthy of the guillotine is being redefined by outsiders who have left
space for their peers to join in on their own terms.

Closer to home, the reboot of Disney‘s The Little Mermaid will see
the titular Arielle played by Halle Bailey. She is black, racists are
mad, and it has created an intense media blitz that is ironic for a film
based on an almost-200-year-old story about an outsider’s plight in
a homogeneous world. The fact that racists are better at tantrums
than reading history might even help the film in the end, given the
amount of free publicity they’ve generated.

That said, the new Little Mermaid has happened with Disney’s
permission. While not an altogether useless move towards richer
23
visibility, those decisions are probably rooted more in #OscarsSoWhite
diversity quotas than an altruistic act questing toward genuine equity.

This is why emerging animators—who don’t have a seat at Disney’s

boardroom table and are presumably not about to make the leap
into a country music career—should feel a certain hope when they
look at memers. While a scroll through the Instagram account
of @wurfelhouse or deep-irony
groups on Tumblr, Facebook and
Reddit (Gangster Popeye, Kosher
Certification Pending Memes and
Being Passive Agressively Gay,
to name a few) may not be for the
faint of heart, they do exemplify an
accessible queer subversion of cis-
heteronormative symbols. Namely,
a voraciously homoerotic
 depiction of Jim
Davis’s Garfield.

Davis, a picture of
palatability within
dominant culture,
i s a s t r a i g h t- c i s
white man raised
on a Midwester n
A merican farm,
who is also a
fraternit y alumnus. He has created the world’s most syndicated
newspaper cartoon, which has been adapted into a seven-season
animated television series, CGI show and five movies, plus video
games, books and other media.

Both Wurfelhouse and more anonymous creators use their drawing,

24
Adobe and social media skills to not only strip Garfield of his identifiable
gender-and-sexual traits, but to upend prevalent mediocrity and the
systems that reward it in the process.

All this is to say that regardless of medium, an increase in represen-

tation is available to artists when they choose to thoughtfully dismantle
cultural icons created and owned by straight, cisgender people. The
artists this strategy is most available to, in the author’s opinion,
are animators.

You are the closest thing our world has to alchemists. Not only do
you write, draw, film, edit and produce your own stories, the best
of your work is satire leagues better than any hacky Sacha Baron
Cohen project, backpedaling Judas K. Rowling tweet, or homophobic
newspaper cartoon of Trump and Putin making out.

Animators can seize the symbols taking up an inhibiting amount of

space, reprogram them into queer revolution and, most importantly,
make room for more original queer ideas.
Choose the right target and let your talent do the rest. If you can assail
the straight art effectively, you will open a void readily available to
your fellow queer animators. Try animating the Calgary Tower into
a dildo, the Giant Blue Ring into a coathanger, the Stampede into a
kinky orgy.

The more we erase their space, the more we open up for us.

25

C O L I N GAL L ANT

Colin Gallant is a writer and editor whose work has appeared

in Avenue, BeatRoute, FREQ and bathroom stalls across the
country. He has most often written about music, pizza and beer.
Colin is also a co-founder of Pink Flamingo, a queer pop-up party
operated in his home city of Calgary, AB. When not looking at vile,
explicit things on the internet, he enjoys karaoke and an ice-cold
Tequila Sunrise.
 FILM S

Adorable And Then She Kissed Me

Cheng Hsu Chung Alexia Khodanian
5:48 | 2018 2:06 | 2019

Aquarium Dating Sucks

Yonatan Tal Sam Berliner
3:36 | 2015 12:40 | 2013

Dissonance Erika & Anju

Charlie (formerly Anna) Ngo Clara Horst
3:35 | 2015 2:53 | 2016

Goodbye Forever Party Huellas

Jonni Phillips José Manuel Silvestre
26 19:43 | 2017 2:00 | 2018

Queer Heroes Les lèvres gercées

Kate Jessop Fabien Corre, Kelsi Phung
5:06 | 2016 4:51 | 2018

蓮花燈 Lotus Lantern Out

Calvin Xingpei Shen Roscoe Rappaport
6:30 | 2017 2:26 | 2018

Shudo Teagan
To-Anh Bach, Charles Badiller, Igor Coric, Sheldon Liberman
Hugo Weiss 2:53 | 2016
2:03 | 2015

uuuuuu
David Delafuente
4:00 | 2015
 Illustrations in this chapter by
Lyndon Navalta

27

SCRE E N E D AT

CALG ARY CENT RAL L I BRARY

August 2 7, 2 019
28
 A Q U E E R H I S T O RY O F
C ANAD I AN AN I MAT I O N

2 29
30
 2
For the second issue in the Quickdraw Animation
Society's series of zines and screenings on LGBTQ2S+
animation histor y, we're examining Canadian
31
queer animation.

Sam Decoste's essay contextualizing 21st century

Canadian films in the broader scope of the political
and cultural struggles of the queer community is an
enlightening read, and one that adds to the power
of these highly personal films. Jillian Fleck's comic,
meanwhile, is an important reminder of the power of
creative expression to create and shape an identity.

We feel incredibly fortunate to be able to share these

works with you, and hope you enjoy them as much
as we have.

Mike Hooves
32
 LOOKING INTO THE PAST:
2 0 Ye ars of Canadian Queer
A u t o /B io gra phica l A nima tio n

Sa m D ecoste

If history were past, history wouldn’t

matter. History is present … you and I
are history. We carry our history.
We act our history.

- James Baldwin | 1965

Courtesy National Film Board of Canada
Narcissus | Norman McLaren | 1983

33

It’s been 50 years since the Stonewall Uprising in Greenwich

Village, where a police raid at a known gay bar, the Stonewall
Inn, sparked six days of protests and clashes between
members of the LBGTQ2S+ community and the New York
police. And it’s been over 35 years since Operation Soap,
the Canadian equivalent in Toronto, where nearly 300
men were arrested as the result of violent police raids at
four Toronto bathhouses. Back then, being out was a sure
way to risk dismissal if you were a professor or a teacher;
 dishonourable discharge if were an RCMP officer, in the military, or a
public sector employee; and imprisonment, brutal beating, homicide, or
sexual assault if you performed anything but cis heterosexuality. This
was equally true for artists: Norman McLaren, founder of the animation
studio at the National Film Board of Canada (NFB 1941-1983), wasn’t
out. Although he had been in a life-long relationship with partner Guy
Glover since the 1930s, his sexuality wasn’t public knowledge until
after his death in 1987.

The silencing effect of the closet has also frustrated the development of
a cohesive, tangible LGBTQ2S+ history. We know in broad strokes what
happened when, but the picture is hazy when it comes to the details,
and first-person narratives are few and far between. Animators Sonya
Reynolds and Lauren Hortie can attest to this paucity of information.
Their three documentaries: Whatever Happened to Jackie Shane?
(2014), Midnight at the Continental (2015) and Meet Me Under the
Clock (2017) tell stories of the profound effect bar culture has had
34
on how we came together as a community in the 1950-70s. In a CBC
interview, Hortie explains the decision to animate a mix of archival
material and shadow puppets using overhead projectors was "because
the queer community was so marginalized and even criminalized in
that time that there's not a ton of documentation" (Kenins). Indeed Meet Me Under the Clock | Reynolds & Hortie | 2017
 the article credits the very existence of these films to Reynolds and
Hortie’s steadfast commitment to preserving queer stories.

Archiving and celebrating queer auto/biographical animated films

is one way to fill in the blanks of this missing history. These short
films broaden historical narratives in a way that includes us. Auto/
biographical animation makes us the tellers of our tales and provides
proof that we existed at certain points in time. We seldom think of
the past as living, as part of who we are now, yet how we identify and
choose/are free to be in this world is invariably a combination of the
past and present. By examining the intersection of Canadian queer
history and auto/biographical animated shorts, Looking Into the Past
hopes to deepen our understanding of the films themselves, and show
us how far we’ve come.

A RECENT HISTORY

35
Neither the protagonist in the trilogy Misadventures of a Pussy
Boy (2002-2003), a paper cut-out animation by Alec Butler, nor in
Listen (2004), a 2D hand-drawn animation by Susan Justin, fit the
stereotypical gender embodiment. Indeed, discrimination based on
gender expression is integral to both narratives. Set in the 1970s,
Listen | Susan Justin | 2004
 Butler’s film tells the story of Alick’s ‘misadventures’ with his first love
Kay. They are brought together by mutual peer mistreatment: Alick
because he is queer, Kay because she is Metis. Alick is unsure of his
identity when Kay asks “Do you want to be a boy?” Similarly, the mother
in Listen is confused by not being able to place her daughter into one
of the either/or categories of sex and gender. When the protagonist
tells their mother for the eighth consecutive year that they are queer,
the mother pretends not to hear by warding off speech bubbles and
asking plaintively, “Why must you look like a boy?”

Today, many of us self-identify. We realize gender expression and

identity are subjective, nuanced, and complex. This means adding
more to our ever-expanding moniker of LGBTQ2S+ whose steady
growth, as Jack Halberstam explains, is “because people are seeing
all the things that fall out of the binary, and [are] demanding that a
name come into being” (Schulman). Until 2017, gender in Canada was
legally a binary concept that labelled people as either feminine or
36
masculine, with gender conforming to sex determined at birth. And
although gender identity and expression are relatively new concepts,
the first of many attempts to include them in the Canadian Human
Rights Act and Canadian Criminal Code was instigated by MP Bill
Siksay in 2005 (Bill C-392 (Historical)).

A year earlier, in 2004, the NFB released Shira Avni’s animated

documentary John & Michael (NFB, 2004). Set in a group home, this
short recounts the poignant story of love between two men with
Down syndrome. Beautifully animated clay-on-glass sequences
relate everyday moments of sharing meals, playing, and working. In
a telling scene, they seek comfort during a storm, push their beds
together, and gently kiss.

In the years prior to John & Michael, disability activists began voicing
their ongoing demand to deinstitutionalize persons with intellectual
disabilities. They not only want closures, but assurances that the
abuse at these institutions won’t be repeated. Kory Earle, president
of People First of Canada, explains that this entails a shift in focus
 from financial gain to care, to allow for the full participation of all
members in our community. He adds that those with intellectual
disabilities, their families and allies, need to have control over services,
not profit-seeking businesses in the disability sector (Spagnuolo &
Earle). And although the doors of Ontario’s last such establishment
closed in 2009, a number of institutions across Canada are still in
existence today.

The year before that closure, Trevor Anderson used a mix of live
action and animation in his short The Island (2008). Prompted by hate
mail suggesting all gay men be “put on an island where you can give
each other AIDS,” Anderson envisages Faggot Island: a homo-utopia.
Animation enters when he begins to describe this imaginary refuge,
where “it would be like the ’70s all over again.” Men on this self-contained
island could set the norms, deifying instead of stigmatizing those
who died of AIDS. As he marches gayly forward through snow and
sand, Anderson not only posits our history in a linear sense, but also
37
illustrates how humour may be used to point out the inanity inherent in
homophobic attitudes.
The Island | Trevor Anderson| 2009

When he animated The Island, the fight against the HIV/AIDS epidemic
had been waging for 25 years. Health Canada and Canadian Blood
Services (CBS) issued a blanket ban prohibiting gay men from
 donating blood—a policy that remained in full force until it was
reduced to a sexual relations abstinence period of five years in
2013, one year in 2016, and three months in 2019 (Larsen). In the
years leading up to Anderson’s film, common-law benefits and
obligations were extended to partners in same-sex relationships
(2000), and same-sex marriage had been legalized in all provinces
and the Northwest Territories by 2005 (CBC Timeline: Same-sex
rights in Canada).

In 2009, a year after The Island’s release, approximately 100

people joined Canada’s first ever Trans March as part of Toronto
Pride. This number would reach 10,000 in 2016, the largest in the
world (Eisenberg and Goldsbie). Three years later, a miniature
claymation protagonist enters our day-to-day world and candidly
shares their experiences in Elisha Lim’s autobiographical
stop-motion shorts. In 100 Butches #9: Ruby (2012) this tiny narrator
sits atop of a can opener and the rim of a plant pot, and climbs up the
38
side of a teapot as they tell the story of their first crush in 1992. The
film ends when they ask themselves in a diary entry, “Am I gay?”

In their second film, 100 Crushes Chapter 6: They (2014), we are privy
to Lim’s process of accepting and using their roommate’s choice of
pronoun, “they”, as they move from disbelief to envy to acceptance.
Shortly thereafter, in 2016, Diane Obomsawin’s 2D animated short,
Courtesy National Film Board of Canada
I Like Girls | Diane Obomsawin | 2018
I Like Girls (NFB), shares four autobiographical accounts of (un)
requited love and coming out. These recollections reach back more
than 30 years to a time when there were effectively no supports,
guidance, or role models to help make sense of feelings that fell
outside of the hetereosexual norm. A common thread between
each narrative is the isolation particular to queer love. We see this
when Charlotte reaches her incredulous epiphany, “wow, you can
kiss a girl!” and when Mathilde and her girlfriend—although happy
together—feel quite alone in the larger world where everyone is
assumed to be straight. Indeed, to separate her from her girlfriend,
Marie’s mother sends her to live in another province, and in the
final segment, Diane is so overwhelmed by the sight of two women
kissing on the TV screen, she turns it off. What these anecdotes
do that the dusty chronicles of history are unable to is humanize
facts by imbuing them with humour, feelings of infatuation, elation,
and loneliness.

39
The timeframe represented in Obamsawin’s film coincided with
the latter part of a national security campaign known as the
Gay Purge (1950-1990s) that expelled LGBTQ Canadians from the
public service, the RCMP, and the military. At the height of the purge,
the Canadian government commissioned a Carleton University
professor to develop what became known as the Fruit Machine,
a contraption the government hoped would determine a person’s
sexual orientation. Sarah Fodey, director of the documentary The
Fruit Machine (2019) notes that more than just jobs were lost. “In
fact, for many, losing their jobs was the least of what they endured
directly because of this campaign," she says. "Poverty, homelessness,
having to go back in the closet, substance abuse, gay aversion
therapy, sexual assaults, and for some—suicide” (Kneght). Prompted
by pressure from the We Demand an Apology Network (2015),
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau officially apologized on behalf of
the Canadian government in 2017, stating:
 Today, we finally talk about Canada’s role in the systemic
oppression, criminalization, and violence against the lesbian,
gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and two-spirit communities...
And it is my hope that in talking about these injustices, vowing
to never repeat them, and acting to right these wrongs, we can
begin to heal.

(Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada)

Being misunderstood by an indifferent and heartless world underscores

all three accounts in Alli MacKay’s Flash Flood (2017). Animated by
transgender artists from different countries, the film rotoscopes rising
and falling flood waters to depict the isolation felt when growing up
trans. It opens with the first of three narrators sitting on a roof of a
house submerged in water as they relate a recurring dream about being
the only survivor of a planet-wide flood. We move from one narrator
40
to the next as they share introspective observations about changing
identities, bullying, and labels. In the end, the three narrators find
a kind of solace and are seen sitting together on the roof of a house
against a dry abandoned landscape.
Flash Flood | Alli MacKay | 2018
Outcognito | Wrik Mead | 2018

This split between who we are and how we are portrayed is also
evident in Wrik Mead’s Outcognito (2017), which sets inner knowledge
against hateful stereotypes in mainstream media. The visuals feature 41
desaturated rotoscoped imagery layered onto photographs, while in
the audio, a sound collage of homophobic slurs from sitcoms is mixed
with autobiographical accounts of self-acceptance. These first-person
perspectives challenge accepted negative portrayals and recognize
the diversity in our experience. As the imagery of two men kissing
in the closing scene becomes one with the background wall, we hear
the testimonial: “Growing up I had always assumed that being gay
meant acting a certain way, and talking a certain way, having certain
interests, and it’s not true. It’s just not” (Mead).

A HOPEFUL FUTURE

This cursory look at the past 20 years of Canadian queer animation

demonstrates that ‘being’ is a personal, multilayered, multifaceted,
and introspective thing. Each of the shorts mentioned in this zine
animates a unique life experience, a piece of the past that when stitched
together provides some insight into our history. And while this small
collection of animated films doesn’t provide a complete picture of
ourselves, we can see animation’s potential: by racing through time,
 or by expanding a moment to accentuate emotion, animation can
portray both the world out there, and the personal, interior space of
lived experience (Honess Roe 170).

Reach the Sky | Daniel Sterlin-Altman | 2018

Creating and archiving queer auto/biographical animated films is one
way to show our many ways of being, and add to our historical records.
42
In Reach the Sky (2018), Daniel Sterlin-Altman shows the diversity
and the shared reality in our community as it references the past,
present and future. Breathtaking both for its stop-motion technique
and its sentiment, this poetic short merges animation with music set
to Rita MacNeil’s lyrics. A fork in the road sends three friends down
different paths, and they encounter, in turn, their legacy, identity, and
love. In the end, as they soar through the sky accompanied by new
friends they’ve made along the way, the audio intones a hopeful future:

And when the night brings on the stars

We'll be there, we'll remember
We've reached across, we've touched a spark
The story's just beginning
WORKS CITED
“Bill C-392 (Historical).” Openparliament.ca, Open North, openparliament.ca/
bills/38-1/C-392/.

Eisenberg, Ethan, and Jonathan Goldsbie. “Record-Setting Trans March

Heartbreakingly Beautiful.” NOW Magazine, Metro Publisher, 3 July 2016,
nowtoronto.com/news/toronto-trans-march-2016/.

Kenins , Laura. “Gay and Night: Putting Toronto's Queer Nightlife Back in Shadows -
Shadow Puppetry, That Is | CBC Arts.” CBCnews, CBC/Radio Canada, 24 Mar. 2017,
www.cbc.ca/arts/gay-and-night-putting-toronto-s-queer-nightlife-back-in-shadows-
shadow-puppetry-that-is-1.4039523.

Kneght, Peter. “The Fruit Machine: Why Every Canadian Should Learn About This
Country's 'Gay Purge' | CBC Arts.” CBCnews, CBC Canada, 30 May 2018, www.cbc.
ca/arts/the-fruit-machine-why-every-canadian-should-learn-about-this-country-s-
gay-purge-1.4678718.

Harris, Kathleen. “'Our Collective Shame': Trudeau Delivers Historic Apology to

LGBT Canadians | CBC News.” CBCnews, CBC Canada, 29 Nov. 2017, www.cbc.ca/
news/politics/homosexual-offences-exunge-records-1.4422546.

Larsen, Karin. “Blood-Donation Deferral Period Drops to 3 Months for Gay, Bisexual
Men | CBC News.” CBCnews, CBC Canada, 8 May 2019, www.cbc.ca/news/canada/
british-columbia/gay-bisexual-men-blood-donation-deferral-period-1.5127608.
43
Reid, Emily. “Celebrating Toronto with Sarah Goodman, Sonya Reynolds, and Lauren
Hortie.” Toronto Outdoor Picture Show, Toronto Outdoor Picture Show, 25 June 2018,
www.topictureshow.com/interview/2018/6/25/goodman-reynolds-hortie.

Honess Roe, Annabelle. Animated Documentary. Palgrave Macmillan, 2013.

Schulman, Michael. “Generation LGBTQIA.” The New York Times, The New York
Times, 17 Jan. 2013, www.nytimes.com/2013/01/10/fashion/generation-lgbtqia.html.

Slaughter, Graham. “'The Canadian Stonewall': Toronto Police 'Expresses Its Regret'
for Gay Bathhouse Raids.” CTVNews, CTV News, 23 June 2016, www.ctvnews.
ca/canada/the-canadian-stonewall-toronto-police-expresses-its-regret-for-gay-
bathhouse-raids-1.2956225.

Spagnuolo , Natalie, and Kory Earle. “Freeing Our People: Updates from the Long
Road to Deinstitutionalization.” Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, 4 July 2017,
www.policyalternatives.ca/publications/monitor/freeing-our-people-updates-long-
road-deinstitutionalization.

“TIMELINE | Same-Sex Rights in Canada | CBC News.” CBCnews, CBC/Radio

Canada, 25 May 2015, www.cbc.ca/news/canada/timeline-same-sex-rights-in-
canada-1.1147516.

Trudeau, Justin. “Remarks by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to Apologize to

LGBTQ2 Canadians.” Prime Minister of Canada, Government of Canada, 24 Apr.
2018, pm.gc.ca/eng/news/2017/11/28/remarks-prime-minister-justin-trudeau-
apologize-lgbtq2-canadians.
44

S AM D E C O S T E

I am an independent animator and educator based in Halifax.

I directed and animated the documentary short Mary & Myself
(National Film Board prod Annette Clarke 2013), which was
nominated for a 2014 Best Short Documentary Canadian Screen
Award and won the Shelagh MacKenzie Award for Excellence in
Filmmaking from the Nova Scotia Talent Trust. I’ve also animated
gallery installations including Cahun: Framed (2015) and Cahun:
Unframed (2014). My animated short, Sincerely Yours, Mrs. Taylor
(2017) won the Audience Choice Award at the Emerging Lens
Cultural Film Festival (2018). I teach animation and writing courses
at NSCAD University.
 FORMING
45

JI L L IA N FLECK
46
47
48

J I L L I AN F L E C K

Jillian is a multidisciplinary artist and writer who specializes in

graphic narrative. They received their Bachelors of Fine Art from
the Alberta College of Art and Design in 2012, and their Masters of
Letters in Comic Studies in 2016. Their graphic novel Lake Jehovah
was published in 2016 by Conundrum Press.
 FILM S IN E SSAY

100 Butches #9: 100 Crushes Chapter 6:

Ruby They
Elisha Lim Elisha Lim
1:12 | 2013 2:00 | 2014

Flash Flood I Like Girls

Alli Mackay Diane Obomsawin
6:00 | 2018 12:09 | 2018

The Island John & Michael

Trevor Anderson Shira Avni
6:00 | 2009 11:00 | 2004

49
Listen Meet Me Under the Clock
Susan Justin Sonya Reynolds, Lauren Hortie
3:00 | 2004 14:02 | 2017

Midnight at Misadventures of
the Continental Pussy Boy Trilogy
Sonya Reynolds, Lauren Hortie Alec Butler
9:47 | 2015 5:00 | 2014

Outcognito Reach The Sky

Wrik Mead Daniel Sterlin-Altman
5:00| 2018 6:00 | 2018

Whatever Happened
to Jackie Shane
Sonya Reynolds, Lauren Hortie
8:12 | 2014
 A D DI TI ON A L FILM S IN SCR EENING

Atomic Dragons Beyond the Mirror's Gaze

James MacSwain Iris Moore
4:00| 1981 4:00 | 2012

Bobbi and Sheelagh Continuum

Barb Taylor Noncedo Khumalo
12:09 | 2018 3:00 | 2016

50
 Illustrations in this chapter by
Mike Hooves

51

SCRE E N E D AT

U N IV E R S I TY O F CALG ARY ( RO OM SS 2 03)

Se p t e mb e r 2 0 , 2 0 19
52
 B E Y O N D N O RT H A M E R I C AN
ANI MAT I O N

3 53
54
 3
Quickdraw Animation Society is dedicated to
representing and creating space for the stories of
LGBTQ2S+ films and filmmakers through the creation
of this 4 part screening and zine series - “On LGBTQ2S+
Animation.” By bringing these commissioned essays
and a screening series to our audience, we hope to 55

promote a richer understanding of the important voices

that have contributed to the history of animation, and
to inspire other artists, writers, and animation fans
to tell their own stories.

This zine, the third in the series, is about non-western

animation with a focus on Anime. Anime has influenced
many artists, writers, and consumers of animation to
portray and relate to queer and trans characters. By
referencing the film “The Adolescence of Utena” our
writers were able to explore themes of sexuality,
family, and loyalty.

Abbey Bennett
56
 B I SE XUALIT Y
& THE ADOLESCENCE OF UTENA
Kr i sten Hutchin s on

Utena Tenjou’s queerness is quickly established in the 1999

Japanese anime film The Adolescence of Utena. Her short-
cropped pink hair, jaunty cap, and boy’s clothes differentiate 57

her from the other girls at the Ohtori Academy. On her

first day of school, a fellow classmate approaches Utena to
ask how she is doing. She replies, “Well, I’m sure I’ll enjoy
it here with a cute girl like you around.” Shortly after we
discover Utena has an ex-boyfriend whose photo she still
prominently displays in her room. The viewer is thus clued
in that Utena is likely bisexual.
 The Revolutionary Girl Utena franchise has often been held up as a
canonical example of the representation of bisexuality in non-Western
animation. The story first began as a manga series (1996-1998), then
as a 39 episode television series (1997) and finally as the feature-
length film. The film and TV series focus on a series of duels to win
the hand of the Rose Bride (aka Anthy Himemiya) and ultimately
gain “the power to revolutionize the world”. After receiving a Mark
of the Rose ring, Utena duels, wins Anthy’s allegiance, and over time
becomes undefeated.

58

The Adolescence of Utena is, in many ways, a summary of the plot of

the TV series with a reduced narrative, improved animation, and a
much more explicit bisexual storyline. Utena is horrified by how cruelly
Anthy is treated by current dueling champion Saionji: “Is there any
girl who is happy to be treated like a possession? I will never lose to
anyone who hits a girl!” Determined to win every duel, Utena fights for
the Rose Bride to be recognized as a human being with her own free
will rather than as a trophy. The crucial importance of female agency,
choice, and women’s empowerment are central themes throughout
the film and TV series.
Anthy and Utena’s relationship has a rocky start in the film. Upon
winning her in the duel, Anthy offers herself to Utena, coming on to her
by stroking her body and face and saying, “I do whatever the duelist
says.” Utena rejects her, and when Anthy tries to embrace her again,
59
Utena exclaims, “What were you thinking Anthy? You’re weird.” At
this point it is unclear whether it is her sexual advances or Anthy’s
willingness to be a trophy that Utena finds weird.

However, Utena comes to terms with her attraction to Anthy.

Unfortunately, their first romantic interlude is prefaced by Utena
becoming violent towards Anthy. While this harmful and yet quite
typical trope (a physical fight that quickly transforms into a passionate
sexual encounter) is common in representations of heterosexual sex, it
is particularly prevalent in scenes of queer sex in film and television.
After Utena’s violent outburst, Anthy comforts her and they dance
in the rose garden as tender music plays and rose petals cascade all
around them.

During an art class exercise where students are instructed to draw

each other, Utena apologizes for her violent behaviour. Anthy brushes
it off: “Never mind that. I’m engaged to you Miss Utena.” But Utena is
having none of it, refusing to use the word engaged, and saying she
will no longer duel. She asks Anthy to open up to her: “If we’re going
 to be close, let’s do it properly.” They then undress. Utena’s initial
reluctance about Anthy would appear to be a desire to get to know her
and have Anthy actively choose her rather than be bequeathed to her.
While the sexual nature of their relationship exists primarily as subtext

60

in the TV series, it is much more apparent in the film. Utena decides

that they must leave the world of the academy and escape to the outside
world. I interpret this as a longing to come out of the closet and live
freely. Things get very weird and surreal as Utena transforms into a
pink, scorpion-like car. This transformation appears to be a nod to the
red car in the TV series, a symbol of male power and entitlement. Anthy
is now determined to be her own person and be with Utena, and drives
the car/Utena to freedom, defeating many other vehicles and obstacles.

They shout together: “Grant me the power to revolutionize the world!”

and emerge naked on a motorcycle. Utena says, “So we are now headed
into a world with no roads. Perhaps we won’t be able to make it there.”
Anthy replies, “Utena, I understand now. We were born in the outside
land.” The radio announcer pipes in: “That’s right. The outside world
has not roads but you can always build new roads.” They stare lovingly
into each other’s eyes as the music swells, kissing passionately, their
bodies entwined. The dialogue prefigures the assertion by queer people
that we were born this way and that we need to forge our own paths.

The TV series ends with far less of a celebration of queerness. Anthy

is incapable of escaping her brother Akio’s dominance, stabs Utena
with a sword, and proclaims, “You can never be my prince because
you’re a girl.” Utena rises and continues to fight to free Anthy: “Anthy,
you still don’t know. The only time I have ever been happy was when

61

I was with you.” After saving Anthy, Utena disappears in a barrage

of collapsing rubble. Here we see the typical “bury your gays” plot
line (where one member of a queer couple often dies in a horrific
and unforeseen way) rear its ugly head yet again. There is a bit of a
twist, though, as Anthy decides to leave the academy to go looking
for Utena. She says to Akio, “I have to go now. She isn’t gone. She’s
merely vanished from your world. Goodbye.” So perhaps there is a
happy ending in their future after all?

Although the film does stand on its own, the plot, themes, and characters
do make more sense after watching the TV series, even though the
romantic and sexual nature of Utena and Anthy’s relationship is
never fully represented. Any time they seem to be about to declare
 their love for each other they are interrupted. Suggestions of male
bisexuality are more prevalent in the series, but are equally veiled
as subtext. There is one particularly (unintentionally?) humorous
scene where Akio lays with his shirt undone, surrounded by several
very phallic cacti. Touga, another male protagonist, stands over
him with a cactus in his hand that blooms as he stares longingly at
Akio. In another scene, Akio takes photos of Touga and Saionji as
they provocatively pose shirtless with the top buttons of their pants
undone. These three male characters also have relationships with
women throughout the series.

62

While references to bisexuality abound in Revolutionary Girl Utena,

the franchise never directly uses the word bisexual. This is in part a
product of the time they were created, but it is also quite typical in
many films and TV shows with bisexual and pansexual characters.
Bisexuality is often alluded to but never fully explored. I think this
needs to change, as the use of identity labels are an important first
step in gaining acceptance. To directly use the words bisexual and
pansexual is to make space for us to exist and, in the words of Utena,
“to revolutionize the world.”
Growing up in a small town in rural Quebec in the 1970s and ’80s,
I didn’t know the word for what I was. I was attracted to boys and
girls from a young age, but I buried and denied those feelings and
attractions so I didn’t have to deal with and accept the fact that I was
queer. I don't think I even heard the term bisexual until I was 18 years
old. Discovering that there was a word for my experience blew me
away, in an “OMG! That is what I am” way.

In university I was fortunate to find myself in queer spaces where

bisexuality was not only accepted but celebrated and I had a strong
community of bisexual friends. I came out in a very public way by

63

writing about my bisexuality in the McGill Daily newspaper. Re-reading

that article from 1993, I am sad to see how the issues and stereotypes
about bisexuality I was discussing are still so relevant today: the
exclusion of bisexuals from queer spaces; bi erasure, particularly for
bi men; and stereotypes of bisexuals as hypersexual predators who
are incapable of monogamy.
 When I moved to Vancouver after graduating, I realized that Montreal
had been an unusual mecca of bisexual acceptance. Trying to be a
part of the lesbian community in Vancouver was no easy task as a
self-identified, loud and proud bisexual and I encountered the real
world of bi phobia and bi erasure. I became quite alienated from the
female queer community, finding more acceptance amongst my gay
male friends.

I recently taught an undergraduate university course about

sexualities in contemporary television and many of my students
identified as bi/pansexual women. We talked about the struggles
we still face to be accepted by heterosexual and other queer people.
We discussed how we feel the need to prove our bisexuality by being
in a long term, same sex relationship or that we need to be equally
attracted to both or all genders to verify our bi/pansexual existence.

Nonetheless, the tides of bisexual representation are shifting.

64
Discussions of bisexuality, bi erasure, and bi stereotypes have
hit mainstream Western media and popular culture. In a recent
article in Rolling Stone, Jenna Scherer discusses the prevalence
and importance of bisexual characters in contemporary television:
“Representation matters, and here’s why: Seeing who you are reflected
in the entertainment you take in gives you not just validation for your
identity, but also a potential road map for how you might navigate
the world. For many years, bi- and pansexuals existed in a liminal
place where we were often dismissed outright by not just the straight
community—but the queer community as well. Onscreen representation
is not just a matter of showing us something we’ve never seen before,
but of making the invisible visible, of drawing a new picture over
what was once erased.”

I want to see this trend of improved bisexual representation in

contemporary Western television filter into animation globally in
more comprehensive ways. When it comes to both Western and non-
Western animation, there remains a real dearth of bisexual characters.
There continue to be some notable nods to Japanese anime television
characters being bisexual, including a number of characters on
Cardcaptor Sakura (1998-2000), Ranka in Ouran High School Host
(2006), Rin Asogi in RIN: Daughters of Mnemosyne (2008), Yuri
Katsuki in Yuri on Ice (2016) and Azusa Hamaoka in Grand Blue (2018).

While the Revolutionary Girl Utena certainly was revolutionary for

its time, it kept bisexuality as a subtext rather than as a fully explored
and named orientation. Sadly, despite being implied, the lack of
outright naming of bisexuality often continues in many contemporary
Japanese anime TV series. While the roads didn’t appear to exist in
the outside world for Utena and Anthy, we do have established road
maps now. Let us see increased representations of bisexuality in all
types of animation while moving beyond tired tropes and stereotypes.
Bring on the new and truly revolutionary era of bisexual characters
in every genre of popular culture! It’s time.

65

I l l u s t r a t i o n s b y Ly n d o n N a v a l t a
66

K R I S T E N H UT C H I N S O N

Kristen Hutchinson is an art historian, visual artist, curator, writer,

and art consultant. She is an adjunct professor at the University of
Alberta in the Departments of Art and Design and Women’s and
Gender Studies. She also teaches independent seminars about art
and popular culture in her living room. In her artistic practice, she
uses collage, photography, video, installation, and performance art
to investigate the realms of memory, beauty, mortality, embodiment,
the environment, urban space, queerness, and the macabre. Kristen
is currently writing a non-fiction book about supernatural creatures
and is the editor-in-chief of Luma Quarterly.
 NO LIMITATIONS:
T HE IN HE R E N T Q UE E R N ESS OF AN IMATION

Amia Yokoya ma

67

In our stiff world, where difference is often mistaken as a

problem, it’s nice to dwell in another place where the mind
is asked to stay mushy in order to enjoy the ride. The core
of queerness relies on going against everything we were
told to be right and true. The same is true in the world of
animation, where the compass of “right and true” gets
turned on its head, taken apart and re-oriented. Gravity
rebels, physics has no limitations, anthropocentrism
is rejected, and girls can be princes who turn into cars.
All are perfectly normal in the abnormal space of
animation. In this sense, animation is an inherently
queer art form. With its unapologetic breaking of rules,
its stories unfold with their own sense of magical
consciousness. Figures become elastic, and lines behave
like unstable living substances, disturbing the stillness
of solid perimeters. There are no apologies or explanations
when animated films step outside of the expected
and place us smack in the middle of the "alternative", the
"unreal", the "not-allowed".
 Even in this context, anime stands in contrast to Western popular
television in its representation of difference. When queer characters
or subjects are included at all in Western TV, more often than not the
plot is reliant on the othering or tokenization of those characters’
experience. In anime, more often characters can casually claim their
queerness without needing permission, floating unaffected by the
need to categorize people based on sexual orientation. There is no
need for coming-out moments because there was never a presumption
of heteronormativity to begin with.

One subgenre that embodies this ideal is Mahou Shoujo or “Magical

Girl”, an anime genre where girls invoke magical powers, wear cute
outfits, speak to animals, have impossible hair styles, and rejoice in
queer relationships, gender non-conformity, and strength through
transformation. In these films, girls might desire other girls, or girls
might not be girls at all. Sexuality is more ambiguous, as characters
in Mahou Shoujo have no need to categorize or identify themselves
68
for the sake of their audience.

Revolutionary Girl Utena: The Adolescence of Utena—a personal

favorite within Mahou Shoujo films—gives off a queer effervescence
that permeates the entire film. From the very first scene, we see
fragmented, floating, impossible architecture, and streets suspended
in constant motion. We know we are entering a multi-layered, queer
world running on its own rules—rules that the film is more than willing
to break. Its ending memorably defies expectation: out of nowhere, a
giant car-wash temple is erected, and Utena’s body transforms into a
speed racer so that her love interest, Anthy, can literally come inside
her body and ride her. They drag race into the unknown promise of
a world without roads and undefined freedom, a grey ambiguous
landscape with no distinctions. With that, they take the idea that the
body is not inherently heteronormative (duh!), and with the liberties
granted by the medium of animation, go even further by proposing
that the body is not limited to wholeness or even humanness.
Hair length and color changes without explanation, bodies are
fragmented and fail in terms of the real and yet thrive in the ethos
of their animated universe.

Anthy and Utena offer a complex representation of queerness that

goes beyond their characters' sexual orientation and right into the
threads that make up the tapestry of their world, where bodies are
fluid, transformation is heroic, and love is a spark that brings us into
the unknown.

69

AM I A Y O K O YAMA

I am a multi-media artist who works with animation, video, sculpture,

and installation. My work marks a space where symbols and
aesthetics taken from my personal mythology, science-fiction,
traditional Japanese mythos, and industrialized landscapes become
abstracted into hyper-realities. Time-based works not invested in
sense-making or cohesive narrative, but in partiality, in delivering a
story in pieces, leaving a trail of potential. I use organic, synthetic,
and digital materials to create hybrid figures and interworldly
spaces of fantasy. Born in Illinois, I grew up in a bi-lingual, bi-
cultural, bi-national, bi-religious household. This early childhood
experience of the world carries into my work: Being neither this,
nor that, but finding fleeting senses of home in the debris of failed
attempts to name it.
 FILM

Revolutionary Girl Utena:

70
The Adolescence of Utena

Kunihiko Ikuhara,
written by Yōji Enokido

1:29:32 | 1999
 Additional illustrations in this chapter by
Abbey Bennett

71

SCRE E N E D AT

A LB ERTA U NI V ERS I TY O F T H E ARTS

STA N FO RD P ERROT T L ECTURE THEATR E

Oc to b e r 2 2 , 2 0 19
72
4

FUTURE OF QUEER
ANI MAT I O N

73
74
 4
Talking about the future of queer animation means
understanding where the art form is now, and where it
might be heading. This final section of our publication
looks at contemporary work, speaking to a variety
of practicing animators to understand what drives
their work. It also features contributions from our 75

Zine Committee (all queer animators themselves)

reflecting on this project as a whole—the first of what
we hope will be many examples of artistic creation
inspired by these essays and films.

Quickdraw Animation Society

76
 WAI T I NG O N T H E R E N DE R :
C o n t e m p o r a r y L G B T Q 2 S + A n i mators and the
F u t u re o f Q u eer A nima tio n

S am Gur r y

Our realities are constructed—manifestations of some sort of stressed

desire for tactility. Animation can tell any story, our stories. We have
a breadth of experience—our experiences—and we have the tools
to tell them. Contemporary animation by LGBTQIA+ filmmakers
encompasses a wide variety of story types and sensory experiences.
The animated image is living beyond the constructs of its bounding
box, broadcasting a reach beyond the television or computer screen. As
shades of Ryan Trecartin and Lizzie Fitch’s fever-dreamt imaginings
seep into even casual social media filters, Queer animators continually
seek out new textures and forms to propagate. Animation has a
home in contemporary cinema and art spaces, breathing amidst its
more stationary counterparts. The medium’s immersive nature and 77

potential for transformative space make an attractive environment

for exploration.

While animation is itself a medium encouraging collaboration,

many of the independent animators I spoke to felt distanced from
community. Many did not feel a part of an animation, art, or Queer
community, let alone an intersection of the three. Tan Wei Keong says
people are often “searching for a community to belong to,” and that,
for animators, “most of us do feel isolated” (Tan 2019). Despite this,
spaces are emerging dedicated to fostering a creative environment for
LGBTQIA+ creators—enough so that there are varied palettes between
them and space for each to exist independently.

In academia, there have been calls for papers relating to Queer

Animation topics. Synoptique: An Online Journal of Film and Moving
Image Studies sought out “Animating LGBTQ+ Representations:
Queering the Production of Movement ” in the past year.
The University of Hull hosted a Queer/ing Animation Symposium in
2017 featuring “Nichola Dobson from the University of Edinburgh…
 discussing her biographical work on animation master Norman
McLaren and the impact his sexuality had on his life and work.” (“CFP:
Queer/ing Animation” 2017).

Curatorially, animated Queer programming is burgeoning. Festivals

like Outfest in Los Angeles and New Fest in New York continue
to incorporate animated programming in bite-sized amounts,
often choosing films with a more palatable, mainstream sentiment.
ASIFA East, the United States East Coast branch member of the
Association Internationale du Film d’Animation, hosts an intermittent
Queer animation screening series curated by Tristian Goik. Last
year, filmmaker D’Angelo Madsen Minax hosted TRANimation! at
New York’s Anthology Film Archives as part of the space’s Cinema of
Gender Transgression film series, featuring more radical approaches
to the medium. Malt Adult, based out of Columbus, Ohio, is a bi-monthly
series showcasing animated films from across the globe with a focus
on contemporary work. Sarah Schmidt, the curator (and an animator
78
herself), hosted a program of work with exclusively LGBTQIA+ themes
last year. Programmers seem hungry for Queer animated content
across a spectrum of sensibilities.

Within this spectrum, there is space for educational, didactic work. K.

Kypers Jim’s Introduction to Gender Identity is an animated chapbook
aimed at illuminating gender for those uninformed or unfamiliar. The
piece, adapted from a short story Kypers wrote partially inspired by
her own experiences as an adolescent, centres around teenage Jim
and his burgeoning understanding of his friend Glenda’s identity. The
“crux of the film is encouraging empathy” (Kypers 2019), something
Kypers has found in audience reactions since the release of her film.

In many instances, animation provides a conduit to explore the story

within the self. black enuf*, by interdisciplinary artist Carrie Hawks,
is an autobiographical journey through Hawks’ past. They mix interviews,
testimony, and memory to explore their identity as a Black, Queer
“oddball” who feels like an outsider within their communities. Of their
work, Hawks shares, “I’ve been finding…the more specific you get in your
storytelling, the more universal it gets because people can really identify
with true experiences that you’re going through” (BK Reader 2018).

TENDERNESS

Xingpei Shen utilizes that same universality-through-specificity.

His film, Lotus Lantern, incorporates many elements specific to the
artist. He worked on the film intuitively, drawing objects he remembered
from his childhood in China, allowing the film to shape itself. While
he drew, he “listened to a lot from the old Shanghainese singer Zhou
Xuan, who’s become a Queer icon in China quite recently” (Shen 2019).
The drawings, soundtrack, and nostalgia culminate in a dream space
evoking quiet, Queer sentiments. A figure considers themselves in a
mirror, plucking their nipples and kissing their reflection, calling to
mind Suzan Pitt’s Crocus, another sensual exploration of self.
79
These moments of reflection can start small, with a memory of a touch
or of a certain taste. Jordan Wong’s Mom’s Clothes is a ruminant,
plaintive reflection of one such moment. The piece, animated with
various textiles and articles of clothing, breathes as the fabric slowly
undulates through the frame. Wong provides the soundtrack himself,
close to the mic, speaking in a mix of personal testimony and reclaimed
interviews from other Queer friends. The narrator wonders if he’ll still
be able to be married in the backyard, as his mother promised years
ago. The result evokes a slightly discomforted swath of vulnerability,
one that comes to settle at the end of its several-minute run. It’s
startling in its use of silence, allowing the audience to fill the empty
spaces with their own resonance.

Mom’s Clothes is one of several evocative films of the past few years
highlighting familial relationships. Between Us Two by Tan Wei
Keong features the filmmaker’s private confession to his late mother,
an “exposition of vulnerability and emotions”. The painterly visuals
ebb and flow over photographs, with brushstrokes bringing to mind
 wrinkles and heavy flesh. Tan describes the film as deeply personal
and says it “veered off into an intimate dialogue that included words
that I would only use with [my mother], like the way I pronounce ‘Ma’”
(Tan 2019). The film won the Best Singapore Short Film award at the
Singapore International Film Festival, and yet in Tan’s home country,
sex between two men remains illegal.

Wor k i n g w it h i n a m or e c on v e nt ion a l n a r r at iv e s p a c e ,
Les lèvres gercées, co-directed by Kelshi Phung and Fabien Corre at
France's Gobelins school, imagines a mother and child’s conversation
about gender identity. The film was conceived after having viewed
the documentary Gender Revolution in which a mother’s eyes are
opened to her daughter’s transidentity after a declaration that the
child would not be able to be herself as a girl. Phung, an animator
and activist, “wanted to talk about the background of this story… that
we share as Queer directors and I especially as a non-binary person
who struggled to make my identity mine” (Phung 2019). The piece
80
is tender and contemplative, with occasional vitriol streaking from
the mother’s mouth. Before the credits roll, the child looks over at
her mother, asking, “What happens when I die? Will I be a girl then?”

Within this tender space, more stories resound. Linnéa Haviland’s

Turning, a commissioned piece for “Reducing Fear, Living Confidently,”
an LGBTQ+ project in the United Kingdom, reflects on the impact of
“homo- bi- and transphobia” as it “affects young people”. Smeared lines
and soft curves etch themselves onto the frame illustrating the world
these youth live in. Haviland hosted “two development workshops
with young people at Gendered Intelligence to come up with ideas”
(Haviland 2019) for the film.

Stefan Gruber, an animator and performance artist, has been

externalizing the internal for years. As with their identity as a non-
binary person, their work also exists in a place of liminality. The
creatures in their film Both Worlds fluctuate and blend within their
digital bodies calling to mind Gruber’s descriptor of themselves as a
“marked star spot that is in another galaxy” (Gruber 2019).
NOTHING ABOUT US, WITHOUT US

Animators tend to cloister, which can go against the occasionally fertile

space for collaboration within the medium. Flavourcel Animation
Collective in Vancouver originated when its members sought out a
communal space outside of an institutional and industry context.
Several of its members identify as part of the LGBTQIA+ community
and create works reflecting that placement. Regardless of identity,
Flavourcel’s “collective goal is to demonstrate… that animation is not
only doable but super exciting” (Flavourcel 2019). They meet with
regularity, assigning roles both creative and bureaucratic in order
to work towards their collective goals. Harlo Martens, Flavourcel
member, posits their position as a Queer art creator within its sphere:

“Our work when shown together creates a visual harmony in content

and in feeling. I use animation as an outlet of expression and what I
have to say comes from being stuck in a body and also of transforming, etc.
81
I assume animation as an industry—and those who work in the industry—
feel a little stuck too, partially because the industry has made big decisions
about its accessibility and what animation should look like. Flavourcel hits
two birds with one stone; while we reinvent animation, we simultaneously
redefine gender/norms/anti-capitalist ways of living. (i.e. the Queering
of animation.)”

Outside of this physical collectivity, it’s no surprise that members of

the LGBTQIA+ community find solace in the internet. We can find
soft places to nestle and feel protected and engaged, our misgivings
gone and our idols clicks away. Erma Fiend, an animator, drag king,
and performance artist, deconstructs the body through their animated
gifs that exist almost solely on the internet. The internet provides a
space for them to “isolate a moment in time” and enjoy the “visceral
feeling of watching things morph or destruct”. An interest in the body,
its foibles and soft limits, permeates Fiend’s work in its “infusion [of]
magic into tactile objects” (Fiend 2019). As gifs become more pertinent
forms of digital lexicon, Fiend’s pieces become shorthand Queer-coded
commonalities able to articulate with the stroke of a thumb.
 Kate Jessop’s Tales from Pussy Willow, available online until recently,
was a comedy series focused on young urbanites. Jessop’s intent was
comedy but the show “addresses serious issues such as misogyny and
homophobia”. She reflects, “people have said they find watching some
of the episodes quite painful but I'd like to think I'm holding a mirror
up to society and calling people out” (Jessop 2019). The characters are
digitally collaged, with their faces rendered in stark contrast to their
exaggerated bodies, underscoring the absurdity of their real-life foibles.

Jonni Phillips loves the internet. She has been creating films and
posting them online since she was in junior high, amassing
a dedicated following of LGBTQIA+ youth. Her 2018 film,
Goodbye Forever Party, follows Lillith, a television Teletubby-esque
performer, and her struggles with mental illness and tenuous interpersonal
connections in her life. Phillips says her films are “explicitly about
being transgender and being gay” (Phillips 2019) even if the narratives
concern death, cults, or seeking tattoo shop employment.
82

Phillips’ practice vibrates inside a world of chatter and edges. Her Stilton
series, created in tandem with animator Victoria Vincent, is filmed with
a decade-old web camera and edited with defunct Windows software.
The Final Exit of the Disciples of Ascensia, Phillips’ latest film, builds off
of these established forms. The films’ accessibility, both in material and
internet propagation, create a deft encapsulation of what Queer youth
are seeking on the internet. These are dynamic stories, created using
comfortable tools, through the lens of a vulnerable creator giving it all up
one click away. As for the narratives, she states, “my life isn’t completely
dictated by my transness, by my gayness, they are facets of how I experience
things” (Phillips 2019). Her identity seeps through the construction paper
and peg bars, inspiring the next generation that she herself is a part of.

The humor, vulnerability, and tenderness of our collective experiences

can appeal to those outside of our community. We can prick our fingers,
show our blood, and laugh while being tickled. We are still in an era of
radical pushback against Queer bodies and images of Queer sexuality.
Cheng-Hsu Chung’s graduation film from the Royal College of Art,
Adorable, makes no concessions to heterosexual, mainstream sensibilities.
The story came about intuitively, based on a series of drawings Chung
created of his own experiences. He organized them into a rough timeline
“exploring [his] sexuality, coming out, being bullied, exploring night lives,
and believing in that inclusivity is where love comes from ultimately”
(Chung 2019). Adorable depicts hyperpigmented, tactile sexuality with
aplomb. His next piece aims to continue these explorations through
researching gay pornography and its influences on the public.

Not one to shy away from depictions of sexuality, Clyde Petersen, an

animator, musician, and bon vivant, is diving into his next film, currently
in production. Our Forbidden Country, is a stop-motion film “about Queer
cruising in 1979 in Seattle, Washington”, and will touch upon topics
like “secret and forbidden love, sex with strangers, the lives of hustlers,
the impact of AIDS on homosexuals, historic events and rebellion all
interwoven with several personal narratives.” Petersen was able to fund
the film with a successful crowdfunding campaign online, utilizing his
83
vast network of Queer collaborators, supporters, and friends.

Torrey Pines, Petersen’s last film, is a touching, autobiographical film

about growing up Queer “with [his] mom who is schizophrenic”. Torrey
Pines has “no spoken dialogue… characters communicate through
expressions, grunts and a fake language spoken by Susie Kozawa,
our soundscape artist” (Petersen 2019). The film has toured around
the world with a live band playing over 60 shows in North America
as well as touring Europe and Japan. The choice to not include spoken
dialogue, as well as touring with the film in a variety of spaces, was core to
Petersen’s desire for the film’s accessibility. He reflected on the traveling:

“One thing that was awkward is that we were often one of the rare
Queer films at animation festivals and the rare animated film at Queer
film festivals. So finding a home for us was more about bringing the
film to the people, instead of waiting for permission from festivals
to screen the film. Because if we had waited, we would have barely
screened it anywhere. Some people can benefit from festivals, but
far more, they serve as gatekeepers to what stories are being told."
 Like Flavourcel, Petersen is seeking, and creating, new methods of
sharing Queer animation with the world around us. He “love[s] events
in unorthodox spaces” (Petersen 2019) and surely, with Our Forbidden
Country, that love will only continue to manifest.

WHITE WALLS

As with animated film presented in cinematic spaces, artists working

within the gallery world are eager to manifest internal realities,
externalize fantasy, and put the audience within a particular mindset.

A fantastic Baroque balcony covered in jewels, externalized

extravagance, and Doric columns becomes a transformative stage
for ballroom legend Leiomy Maldonado in Rashaad Newsome’s
STOP PLAYING IN MY FACE! Throughout the four-minute animation,
the rigid edges and soft focus reinforce the interdisciplinary artist’s
collage sensibility. STOP PLAYING IN MY FACE!, also the title work
84
of Newsome’s 2016 show, was exhibited among several still works
exploring ideas of agency and “interpretations of feminism by
transgender and cisgender women of color” (Artsy 2016). The soundtrack
blends audio from several sources including bell hooks, Janet Mock,
and Samantha James Revlon. Status symbols and a crystalline snowfall
envelop Maldonado, dazzling the viewer while calling attention to the
opaque themes within the text itself.

Chitra Ganesh, a Rubin Museum Fellow and multimedia artist, actively

utilizes animation within her practice, blending pop culture, gender,
Hindu mythology, and Queer theory. In “The Scorpion Gesture”, one of
her two concurrent exhibitions at the Rubin Museum in 2018, motion-
activated animations to play amidst the “Masterworks of Himalayan Art”,
a selection of pieces from the museum’s permanent collection. The five
films woven throughout the space showcase Ganesh’s transformations
of form as well as serve to remind the audience that these masterworks
depict a culture and philosophy still very much alive. “The Scorpion
Gesture” itself “refers to a Tibetan Buddhist hand gesture, or mudra,
that represents endless possibilities of transformation” (Patel 2018).
In Silhouette in a Graveyard, a figure outlined in neon with three breasts
becomes a frame for images of contemporary protests, including Pro-
Palestinian and Black Lives Matter marches, as well as environmental
activism. Metropolis concludes with a resurrection and demarcation of
change. The motion-activated sensors take the audience by surprise,
immediately stirring their engagement with the work.

This immediate engagement is what attracts Ganesh to animation. In

an interview with the Rubin Museum, she spoke about this attraction
and how an audience can further engage with challenging material, as
animation provides a known entry point for the observer. For Ganesh,
“integrating contemporary imagery into historic imagery or talking
about them on the same visual register is another way to open up the
significance on how objects can shed light on not just the past in which
they are based but also in our contemporary moment” (Animating the
Unseen – Chitra Ganesh: Face of the Future 2018). Ganesh’s tableaus of
psychosexual mutants, strong women, and alternative realities become all
85
the more immediate in their animated forms. She reflects our own intake
of information back at us through cut collage at 24 frames per second.

Ganesh’s delight in the immersiveness and congruence of animated

forms is something shared by many of her white-walled contemporaries.
Trulee Hall’s recent showings at Los Angeles Frieze and the Maccarone
Gallery reveled in the use of animation for immersion, underscoring
the artist’s strong penchant for texture and tactility. “The Other
and Otherwise”, her debut solo show at Maccarone, is a “nominal
amusement park… defined by an array of heterosexual absurdities”
(Knight 2019). Monitors play surreal images depicting monsters,
psychosexual fiends, and eager young women. Hall’s work incorporates
claymation, CGI, puppetry, and live action, invoking a dreamlike space
where things can definitely hurt you. In Hall’s most recent film, Eves
Mime Ménage, women caress and kiss each other deeply. As with her
installations, the figures “undulate and overlap one another, their
bodies often blending together” (Halpert 2019). Its jagged stop-motion
movements allow for a playful sexuality that embraces the texture so
important to Hall, a tactility bred in animation.
 A desire for a physical tactility mounts us in an immediate, tangible
space. Outside of this tangibility is where Jacolby Satterwhite’s playful
tactility lives. Satterwhite, who earlier this year served as a contributing
director for Solange’s new album When I Get Home, builds Queer
environments encompassing dance, memory, and personal mythologies.
His 3D animated tableaux convulse and morph across the body of
his work. His most recent piece, Birds in Paradise, is a two-channel
installation which features many facets of his work including “chance
and irrational juxtaposition… a Queer Boschian tableau, punctuated
by performances by artists, Queer activists, dancers, sex workers, and
actors from his community” (Art Basel 2019). The soundtrack itself
is a tableau, an airy club track created in collaboration with musician
Nick Weiss and Patricia Satterwhite, the artist’s late mother. Patricia
recorded hundreds of a cappella tracks on a K-Mart cassette player,
which Satterwhite and Weiss utilized to create “a soundscape that
doubles as a time warp” (Lozano 2016).

86
Satterwhite’s space isn’t liminal. It boldly asserts itself and brandishes
its forms, leaving impressions on soft flesh. Unlike cinematic spaces
with an audience alone in the dark, there is no shield. Satterwhite,
like his work, seeks space to exist in safety and celebration with other
Queer Artists of Colour. In a 2007 interview with Out Magazine,
Satterwhite opined:

“I think that no matter what I do I’m aware of metonymy and

the codes associated with bodies, genders, races, mental illness,
outsider, insider—I’m aware of what Queerness really is… I was
born and raised by a mentally ill woman who was in a mental
institution, I had two gay brothers, and I had a heavy involvement
in nightlife since I was 13—all of these safe spaces, alternative
space. That’s why I did a galactic-looking visual 3D film. All of
this is like a metaphor for the safe space that I only understand
being someone who was constantly externalized.”
Liminality need not apply. Satterwhite has described those of his
generation as “melting pots” (SFMOMA 2016). As his mother’s own
music blends swathes of musical genres, so does his own work. The
melting pot of his experience becomes robustly formed by its medium,
settling into a space that echoes inside.

AND NOW?

Where do we go from here? As evidenced by the breadth of creative

direction from the animators spoken to, they desire even more
variation in storytelling form as they look toward the future.
Jonni Phillips wants “more animated films that are about gay
heartbreak and being in love and being closeted and just existing as
a gay person” (Phillips 2019). Jordan Wong seeks films that invoke
empathy without “some sort of massive trauma displayed on screen”
(Wong 2019). Erma Fiend wants performers to harness the “potential
for face-filter art and self portraits in motion” (Fiend 2019). Kelsi
87
Phung puts their desires succinctly,

“I would like better visibility for Queer and people of colour in

the animation industry. I would like cis directors to stop speaking
FOR trans and non-binary people, I would like white people to
stop speaking FOR people of colour. I want to hear a lot more ‘us’,
‘talking about us’, ‘for us’. That would be a real game change.”

There is a strong push for change, inside and out of the community. With
the “growing pool of Queer animators in the world” (Petersen 2019), new
forms of narratives, techniques, and showcases feel emergent now in a
way that they haven’t felt in some time. We have the tools—our tools. We
have the stories—our stories. Contemporary animation by LGBTQA+
filmmakers continues—and will continue—to expand, encompassing the
breadth of experience and imaginings within. Our animated internal
realities are just waiting to be externalized. Just wait for the render.
 WORKS CITED

Art Basel. “Jacolby Satterwhite: Birds in Paradise.” Art Basel, 2019, www.artbasel.
com/catalog/ artwork/85818/Jacolby-Satterwhite-Birds-in-Paradise.

Animating The Unseen - Chitra Ganesh: Face Of The Future.” Rubin Museum
Media Center, Apr. 2018, rubinmuseum.org/mediacenter/animating-the-unseen.

“Carrie Hawks' Award-Winning Short Film 'Black Enuf*' Is a Quest...” BK Reader,

18 Aug. 2018, www.bkreader.com/2017/10/17/carrie-hawks-award-winning-short-
film-black-enuf-quest-acceptance- identify/.

“CFP: Queer/Ing Animation.” The Fan Studies Network, 15 Feb. 2017, fanstudies.
org/ 2017/02/15/cfp-queering-animation/.

Chung, Cheng-Hsu. Personal Interview. 2019

Fiend, Erma. Personal Interview. 2019.

Flavourcel. Personal Interview. 2019.

Gruber, Stefan. Personal Interview. 2019.

Halpert, Juliana. “Trulee Hall.” Art in America, 25 Apr. 2019, www.

artinamericamagazine.com/ reviews/trulee-hall/.

88 Haviland, Linnéa. Personal Interview. 2019

Jessop, Kate. Personal Interview. 2019.

Knight, Christopher. “Review: The Psychosexual Madness of Trulee Hall's Show

at Maccarone Gallery.” Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 20 Feb. 2019, www
latimes.com/entertainment/ arts/la-et-cm-trulee-hall-maccarone-20190220-story
html.

Kypers, K. Personal Interview. 2019.

Lozano, Kevin. “Listen to ‘Birds in Paradise’ by Patricia Satterwhite / Jacolby

Satterwhite / Nick Weiss.” Pitchfork, Pitchfork, 19 June 2016, pitchfork.com/
reviews/tracks/18378-patricia-satterwhite-jacolby-satterwhite-nick-weiss-birds-
in-paradise/.

Osenlend, R. Kurt. “Jacolby Satterwhite Evokes Queer Spaces Of Every Kind In

Epic Tribute Album To His Late Mother The Multi-Faceted Artist Reveals The
Story Behind His Most Personal Work Yet.” Out Magazine, 10 Mar. 2017.

Patel, Alpesh K. “Chitra Ganesh | Rubin Art Museum.” Art Forum, Oct. 2018.

Petersen, Clyde. Personal Interview. 2019

Phillips, Jonni. Personal Interview. 2019.

Phung, Kelsi. Personal Interview. 2019.

“Please Enter the Mind of Jacolby Satterwhite · SFMOMA.” SFMOMA, www.

sfmoma.org/read/please-enter-mind-jacolby-satterwhite/.

“RASHAAD NEWSOME: Stop Playing in My Face!: De Buck Gallery.” Artsy, Artsy,

9 Mar. 2016, www.artsy.net/show/de-buck-gallery-rashaad-newsome-stop-playing-
in-my-face

Ray, Sharmistha. “A Feminist Artist's Postcolonial Animations.” Hyperallergic, 7

May 2018, hyperallergic. com/441210/chitra-ganesh-the-scorpion-gesture-rubin-
museum-of-art-2018/.

Shen, Xingpei. Personal Interview. 2019

Tan Wei Keong. Personal Interview. 2019

Wong, Jordan. Personal Interview. 2019.

89

S AM GUR RY

Sam Gurry is a multidisciplinary artist, writer, and educator. Their

films have been in the official selection at the Toronto International
Film Festival, SXSW, Slamdance, Ann Arbor, and the Ottawa
International Animation Festival, amongst others. Sam received
an MFA from CalArts in Experimental Animation. They live in
Hollywood, California, but don’t hold it against them.

Formerly an antiques appraiser, Sam’s practice explores the

ephemeral, especially as it concerns the manifestation of unintended
personal archives. They are currently adjunct faculty at California
State University Los Angeles in the Animation Department, and
they perform as one half of expanded cinema duo Saint Victoria’s
Incorruptible Body, providing guitar and vocals.
90

MAR I A S T O I AN

Maria Stoian is an illustrator and comics artist based in Edinburgh.

She cares about feminism, the state of the world, and making things
look nice. Her first graphic novel, Take it as a Compliment, is a
collection of real-life stories of sexual violence. Her comics have
appeared in anthologies such as Drawing Power and We Shall Fight
Until We Win, and she regularly contributes non-fiction comics for
The Nib. She also likes to make zines and is probably checking the
news right now.
 SAILOR'S OUT
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M A R I A STOI A N
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94
AB B E Y B E NN E T T

Abbey Bennett is an animator and artist from Calgary, Alberta.

She is the current recipient of Quickdraw Animation Society’s
Chris J Melnychuk Scholarship. Her animation practice focuses
on themes of queerness and mental health, and she employs 2D,
tactile animation techniques like hand painting cels.

Abbey tries to make things that look the way she wants to see the
world. She began animating in 2017 shortly after graduating from
the University of Victoria with a Bachelor of Fine Arts. Watch out
for her upcoming film in the 2020 edition of Quickdraw’s GIRAF
Animation Festival.
 IN BETWEEN
95

3 AB B EY BE NNETT
96
97
98 MI K E H O O VE S

Mike Hooves is a prairie queer and multi-disciplinary artist working

in illustration, animation, and film in Calgary, Alberta. Having
received their BDes from the Alberta College of Art + Design
in 2016, Mike has become a fixture in artist-run and non-profit
communities through their work with Calgary Queer Arts Society,
the Quickdraw Animation Society, Buds Collective, and Herland.
Mike’s film practice has seen their work exhibited internationally,
including Vancouver, Montreal, as well as in London and Warsaw.
Using colour, shape, and mark-making, Mike playfully explores the
inner workings of queer life.
2
HYBRIDITY
99

M I KE HOOVES
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 LY ND O N NAVALTA

102
Lyndon is a multi faceted artist and designer from Calgary, Alberta.
He is currently working as a freelancer and a sessional instructor
for the Alberta University of the Arts. Upon graduating from the
design program at the AUArts (formerly known as Alberta College
of Art + Design) in 2013, he had collaborated with the National Film
Board of Canada as an assistant art director, concept artist, texture
artist, compositor, and special effects artist for the acclaimed short
film Skin for Skin, directed by Kevin Kurytnik and Carol Beecher.

In his free time, he expresses his artistic visions through highly

detailed digital and traditional paintings. Using nature as a frame
of reference, he combines narratives that speak to our fascination
with the mystique and magic of nature, and humanity’s use of these
stories and symbols.
 TRANSLATE / TRANSFORM
103

LYN DO N NAVA LTA

1
 TRANSLATE / TRANSFORM

104
105
 FILM S

Between Us Two Jim's Introduction to

Tan Wei Keong Gender Identity
5:03 | 2017 K Kypers
4:25 | 2017

Les lèvres gercées Meet Me Under the Clock

Fabien Corre, Kelsi Phung Sonya Reynolds, Lauren Hortie
4:51 | 2018 14:02 | 2017

Midnight at Mom's Clothes

the Continental Jordan Wong
Sonya Reynolds, Lauren Hortie 5:31 | 2018
9:47 | 2015

Queerer Than Thou STOP PLAYING IN

Kate Jessop MY FACE!
106 2:25 | 2019 Rasheed Newsome
4:02 | 2016

Turning Whatever Happened

Linnea Haviland to Jackie Shane
1:50| 2018 Sonya Reynolds, Lauren Hortie
8:12 | 2014

SC R E E N E D AT

G LO B E CI NEMA
A pa r t o f G I R A F 1 5

Nove mbe r 2 1, 2 0 19
 TH A N KS
to ou r sp o nso r s and f u nd e r s

107

Pr i n te d at
 Z IN E COM M ITTE E

C AR O L B E E C H E R

Not sure if she was going to be a theatre technician or an animator, Carol figured either
way she'd have to be an artist, so she went to the Alberta College of Art, graduating in
1987, and made her first film, Ask-Me (16mm cameraless) in 1996. She was Operations
Coordinator of the Quickdraw Animation Society in the 1990s, and oversaw its development
into an internationally recognized production, resource, and education centre for all
forms of animation. Her latest film as Producer/Co-Director/Editor is the multi-award
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winning Skin for Skin, made with the NFB North West Centre in 2017. She is currently in
development on a short animated documentary A Family War Diary. She is also teaching
animation at the Alberta University of the Arts.

RYAN VO N H AGE N

Ryan Von Hagen is an animator, filmmaker, sound designer, musician, animation instructor,
as well as the Programming Director at the Quickdraw Animation Society located in
Calgary, Alberta. Since graduating from the Alberta College of Art + Design in 2012,
Ryan has developed his craft by working on documentaries, interactive animations, film
festival stingers, National Film Board-produced short animated film, as well as leading
community-focused collaborative animated film projects.
 P E T E R H E M M I NGE R

Peter is an arts administrator, writer, festival programmer, and the Executive Director of
the Quickdraw Animation Society. His work aims to create spaces for artistic creation
and discovery, to strengthen artistic communities, and to promote a more idiosyncratic
and collaborative culture. In addition to his work at Quickdraw, he hosts a weekly radio
show on campus and community station CJSW 90.9FM, is president of the board of the
Calgary Underground Film Fest, and occasionally writes about art, culture and policy.

109

NI NA PATAF I
ASSISTANT

Nina Patafi is an illustrator, animator, on-and-off podcaster, and a 4th year student at
Alberta University of the Arts, based in the city of Calgary. Her work has been shown at
AUArts exhibitions, and involves disembodied heads, paper cut-outs, and fashionable
girlfriends. She is interested in the evolution of LGBT+ depiction in cartoons, comics,
and video games over the years.

AB B E Y B E NN E T T pg 80

M I K E H O O VE S pg 84

LY ND O N NAVALTA pg 88
110

QUI CKDRAW STA F F Peter Hemminger – Executive Director

Ryan Von Hagen – Programming Director
Tyler Klein Longmire – Production Director
Mihaela Slabé – Outreach and Education Coordinator

2011 10 Ave SW, Calgary, Alberta Canada, T3C 0K4

(403) 261-5767
quickdrawanimation.ca
Incorporated in 1984, the Quickdraw Animation
Society (QAS) is Calgary’s home for independent
animation. We promote the art of animation through
courses, workshops, screenings, and production
resources for professionals and outsiders alike. Our
programming promotes creativity, collaboration and
accessibility, building an ever-growing community
of artists and enthusiasts.
Our in-house resources include western Canada’s
largest animation library, and an exciting foundation
of introductory through professional-level film and
digital production equipment. We also host the
111
Giant Incandescent Resonating Animation Festival
each November, celebrating the best independent
animation from Calgary and around the world.

WHAT W E DO:

Animation Courses and Workshops for all ages

Equipment and Studio Rental
Animation for your School or Business
Animation Library (books and videos)
Screenings and Events
GIRAF Animation Festival (November)
Memberships ($25-$50 a year)
 Book Design and Cover by
Lyndon Navalta

112

p ro d u ce d at Q UIC KDR AW ANIMATIO N SOCI ETY 2019

ISBN 978-1-7770253-0-4