Watch me Move - The Animation Show

Wendy and I have been to the opening of Watch me Move, it's such a wopping exhibition that sensibly having put refreshments first, we weren't able to even get upstairs by the time we were ushered from the gallery.  So I don't certainly feel in a position to make a detailed report at this juncture. The early part looked really great though, very thorough, all the films that I would have in my top 20 plus many that I didn't know about or havn't seen including Percy Smith's Birth of a Flower from 1910. A very early, very poetic film capturing flowers opening using timelapse.  Smith adapted his film set-up with candle wicks, pieces of meccano, door handles and gramophone needles to record the flowers even while he slept, a large bell being set to ring and wake him up if anything went wrong!


In the exhibition space the early films were projected onto hanging cloth, the fabric creating little spaces here and there, while the films with soundtracks were three or four to a room, faced by sitting booths (modelled by Wendy  below) with speakers in the roof of the booth.  It was still hard to sequester the appropriate sound for the film you were watching, but I don't know how else you could show so many films in one space.  Headphones are tangly and impractical for projected work.   Anyway, it promises to be an exciting time with all the concomitant visitors and screenings.  I'll try and keep abreast of it all for any far away visitors to this blog.