The Animafest Council has made a unanimous decision to give this year’s Award for Outstanding Contribution to Animation Studies to a Georges Sifianos,an author, teacher and scholar whose work unites the complexity and idiosyncrasy of ‘the eighth art’. All of his projects, from mentoring students to artistically mature and exceptional creative animation, to unique research efforts focusing on the aesthetics of animation, perception and mental images, are part of this synthesis. Lately he has been testing new technologies, with an accent on AI.

Born 1952 in Greece, he studied painting and set design at the School of Applied Art in Athens, continuing at the visual communication and art school Les Gobelins in Paris, wrapping up with a PhD in animation aesthetics from Sorbonne, as one of the pioneers in this field in France.

A professor emeritus at ENSAD Paris (École nationale supérieure des Arts Décoratifs), where he established the Department of Animation Studies in 1995, he has shared his knowledge with students from several other schools and universities in France, India, China, Japan and Greece. He has worked on many research projects as a member of groups such as ENSADLab and PSL SACRe (PhD academic programmes focusing on research through practice), and has contributed with his texts to many animation-related books and publications.

His Esthétique du cinéma d’animation won the 2014 McLaren-Lambart Award for best academic book. Lately he has been exploring Symphony of the Parthenon Frieze: using animation and music scale tones he is analysing Phidias’s mastery in the anticipation of movement and subsequent philosophical implications.

An animator decorated with multiple honours and awards, he gave the organisers of Animfest Zagreb a barbed wire hat for martyrs which he made in 1996 with his students at ENSAD. This gift is still passed on ‘from head to head’ and stands for a cherry on the cake of his versatility, creativity and love of animation art.

Georges Sifianos will be the keynote speaker at this year's Symposium for Contemporary Animation Studies Animafest Scanner XII 2025 which takes place 3-4 June 2025 as part of the World Festival of Animated Film - Animafest Zagreb 2025.