Animafest Scanner XIII
KIC, Preradovićeva 5 09 – 10/06, 10:00 – 16:30 h In English, open to public.
The 13th edition of the Symposium for Contemporary Animation Studies Animafest Scanner XIII aims again to create synergy of theoretical and practical discourses and stimulate exchange between filmmakers and scholars. As the worldwide animation studies are rapidly growing and evolving in recent years, catching up with the increasing field of animated films, Animafest Scanner symposium is again at the frontline of the discourse and the interaction of theoretical and practical approaches to animation. The symposium is held as part of the World Festival of Animated Film - Animafest Zagreb. Over the course of its fifty-four-years history, the festival has given a stage to different animation forms and formats in competition and non-competition environments, presenting a worldwide selection of auteur, experimental and mainstream animated films in various programs.
This year the speakers will focus on the following four subjects: Genealogies of Animated Form: From Hand-Crafted Motion to Artificial Intelligence / Writing Animation History: Methods, Periodization and Perspective / Curating Animation: Festivals, Exhibitions and Canon Formation / Music in Animation.
Amid Amidi is this year’s keynote speaker and the recipient of the Animafest Zagreb Award for Outstanding Contribution to Animation Studies for 2026.
Journalist, critic, historian, and publisher, Amid Amidi is the co-founder and, from 2004 to 2025, the publisher and editor-in-chief of Cartoon Brew, an online magazine that became one of the most important platforms for information, criticism, and scholarship on animation in the twenty-first century. Amidi laid the groundwork for much subsequent research through his earlier periodical Animation Blast (1998–2007). Among his many books, the highly influential Cartoon Modern: Style and Design in 1950s Animation (2006), which earned the Theatre Library Association Award, holds a prominent place, as does The Art of Pixar Short Films (2009). His widely respected publications include The Art of “Robots” (2004) and The Art of Pixar: The Complete Colorscripts and Select Art from 25 Years of Animation (2011). In collaboration with Tee Bosustow, Amidi also authored the concise yet innovative and foundational Inside UPA (2007), a logical continuation of earlier research into modern animation. Equally interested in classical, modern, and contemporary animation, Amid Amidi has been a central catalyst and source of inspiration for many colleagues who have followed in his path. While his work continues to evolve, it already represents a major achievement as an exceptional and exemplary contribution to the study of American and global animation.
Historical and current trends, numerous perspectives, new findings in the fast-growing field of animation studies, paired with exciting speakers – all this and more awaits you at the Animafest Scanner XIII symposium, in the context of screenings and other events organised by Animafest Zagreb 2026.
Organisers:
World Festival of Animated film – Animafest Zagreb
Hulahop Film & Art Production
ASIFA Austria
Organising committee:
Daniel Šuljić, MA, World Festival of Animated Film - Animafest Zagreb
Franziska Proksa, PhD St. Pölten University of Applied Sciences / AG Animation Vienna
Nikica Gilić, PhD, Prof., Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Zagreb
Prof. Holger Lang, Independent Scholar
Prof. Hrvoje Turković, PhD, Prof. in retirement, Academy of Dramatic Arts, University of Zagreb
Andrijana Ružić, Independent Scholar, Università Statale di Milano
With support of:
Croatian Audiovisual Centre
Zagreb Tourist Board
City of Zagreb
Croatian Film Authors’ and Producers’ Association
Programme 2026
09/06 TUESDAY
09:45 Welcome & Introduction
PANEL 1: Genealogies of Animated Form: From Hand-Crafted Motion to Artificial Intelligence
Moderator: Nikica Gilić
10:00 – 10:30 Animating an Archive: AI and the Limits of Cultural Heritage Interpretation ,Jürgen Hagler (UAS Upper Austria, Ars Electronica), Celine Pham (media artist)
10:35 – 11:05 Narrative According to Landscape Animation, Akira Arimochi (Aichi University of the Arts)
11:20 – 11:50 Golem Lover: Avatar–Mediated Relationships and the Emergent Languages of Game Worlds, Jenna Caravello (UCLA department of Design Media Arts)
11:55 – 12:25 The Paradoxical Realism of Deconstructed 3D: Why Does Self-Aware 3D Seem More Real than Hyperrealistic 3D?, Paulina Martyna Ziółkowska (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México)
-lunch break-
14:00 – 14:45 Keynote: Whose History Is It?: Telling the Story of American Animation, Amid Amidi (Animafest Zagreb Award for Outstanding Contribution to Animation Studies)
PANEL 2: Writing Animation History: Methods, Periodization and Perspective
Moderator: Franziska Proksa
14:50 – 15:20 Contemporary Chinese Animation Canon: Institutions, Festivals and Transnational Exchanges in Comparative Perspective, Olga Bobrowska (Institute of Art and Design, UKEN University in Kraków), Chunning Maggie Guo (Renmin University of China, Confucius Institute of Geneva University)
-coffee break-
15:35 – 16:05 Anime Auteurs: Rethinking Auteurism in Japanese Animation from Miyazaki Hayao to Ōtomo Katsuhiro, Betty Stojnić (Nagoya University)
16:10 – 16:40 Bruno Edera’s Unfinished History of Pornographic Animation, Aurélie Petit (INRS Montreal)
10/06 WEDNESDAY
09:45 Welcome & Introduction
PANEL 3: Curating Animation: Festivals, Exhibitions and Canon Formation
Moderator: Holger Lang
10:00 – 10:30 A History of Cinema as Art, the Place of Animation: A Comparative Approach, France/United States 1946–1976, Cécile Noesser (ESAD Amiens)
10:35 – 11:05 Curating Socialist Animation: Animafest Zagreb and the Cold War Circulation of Polish Animated Film, Ewa Ciszewska (University of Łódź, Polish Animation Research Group)
-coffee break-
11:20 – 11:50 Curating Feminist Animation: 25 Years of Tricky Women Tricky Realities and the Transnational Politics of Visibility, Canon Formation and Circulation, Martina Tritthart (Institute for Cultural Analysis, University of Klagenfurt)
11:55 – 12:25 Expanded Animation: Curatorial Practices Between Cinema and the Gallery, Paola Orlić (independent curator)
-lunch break-
PANEL 4: Music in Animation
Moderator: Andrijana Ružić
14:00 – 14:30 Freeride in C. Repetitions and Loops as a Form-building Element in Music and Auteur Animation, Edmund Jansons (Atom Art / Art Academy of Latvia)
14:35 – 15:05 Imagine the Unheard. The Radical Aesthetic of Electronic Music in the History of Animation, Jens Meinrenken (freelancer, Humboldt University of Berlin)
15:10 – 15 40 More than Just Noises and Crackling. Artists Associated with the Polish Radio Experimental Studio as the Authors of the Sound and Music for Films by the Polish School of Animation, Katarzyna Figat (The Feliks Nowowiejski Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz)