Figure and Force in Animation Aesthetics by Ryan Pierson (review)

Abstract

After he is ostracized by the kids at school and shushed by his busy father, the titular boy wonder of United Production of America’s (UPA) Gerald McBoingBoing (Robert Cannon, 1950) walks up a frighteningly pendulous staircase— depicted for us as a flat, sawlike path receding sharply into the top left frame. How can viewers explain what it is that we are seeing in this moment, when the stairs never change in perspective as Gerald advances upward, even during a simulated camera trackin? How can we better describe the sensations of movement in animated films that are ostensibly created frame by frame, thus defying our perceptual habits for watching movies and making sense of the movements we see onscreen? And what political possibilities open for us once we begin to think about animated motion beyond the isolated actions of cartoon characters and focus instead on the figures and forces that animate the image? Ryan Pierson tackles these issues in his new book on figural and abstract animation, a farranging analytical work that blends philosophical aesthetics with animation history. In doing so, Figure and Force in Animation Aesthetics generates new frameworks for studying historical receptions of modernism, cinematic motion, and the possibilities for talking about and viewing animated films. Methodologically, Figure and Force in Animation Aesthetics draws from and expands upon the contributions to animation studies previously made by Donald Crafton, Vivian Sobchack, Dan Bashara, and Tom Gunning.