For about 90 minutes on Friday evening, the big screen at LSU’s Digital Media Center Theatre presented 11 unique short films created in places around the world for the 23rd Animation Show of Shows. The screening featured three new films and eight films from past shows. The event was open to the public and free to attend.

The Animation Show of Shows is an annual film screening that takes place in theaters on college campuses throughout the U.S. The show is a rare platform for individual artists to get their work on a big screen in a theater. The show displayed a variety of films employing different artistic techniques and animation styles from stop-motion to computer animation. 
Ron Diamond, the founder of the show, joined a Zoom call that was projected onto the theater screen and briefly introduced the show. Diamond curated the films for the screening himself selecting animations with many different themes. What each film did have in common was the effort and care put into animating them.

“They’re films that I sort of hand picked because I think that they are audience pleasers, extraordinary storytelling and unusual storytelling,” Diamond said. “All animation is incredibly laborious.”

Diamond started the Animation Show of Shows in 1998. Since the start of the program, 41 of the films displayed in the shows have been nominated for Academy Awards, and 11 films have won an Oscar. Most of the short films shown during the screening aren’t available online or on streaming platforms. 

Mark Aubanel, director of the digital arts and engineering program, helped host the event. He discussed the importance of events like ASOS, which spread awareness and appreciation for short films and the art of animation.

“I think from a cultural standpoint, I feel a responsibility to show students things they can’t see online,” Aubanel said. “These are not released. It’s an art form that doesn’t hold up well to the memey, noisy internet culture.

Aubanel said a lot of these were designed for the big screen, not a cell phone video screen.”

Animation in the U.S. dates back to the early 20th century, and Aubanel feels that it’s rich history and cultural significance is worth protecting.

“It’s a cultural tradition in this country,” Aubanel said. “It’s one where there are fewer and fewer venues for them to show, so I think it’s important culturally to preserve the art form.”

Katy Tye, a digital arts and engineering graduate student, worked alongside Aubanel to host the event. Coming from a background with graphic design, she feels that ASOS does a good job of displaying films that reflect the labor and artistry that goes into animation. 

“A lot of these you can tell the rough sketches are still a big part of the art form, so it’s exposing not just culture, but this particular form of art,” Tye said. “It expresses a way different feeling and reality when the pictures are actually moving. I would definitely say it brings more interest into the art side of animation.”

The films shown in the screening Friday were all made by small groups of artists using animation as a medium to express their creativity. 

“As someone who has done individual pieces and been able to claim the recognition for ‘I made this,’ it’s not the same as working on a whole team,” Tye said. “It gives them just that spotlight on themselves and not necessarily on a team.”

The audience in the Digital Media Center ranged from kindergarten students to senior citizens. Some viewers attended searching for creative inspiration while others just stumbled upon the event and gave it a try.

Mitchell Stolier, a staff member at LSU Online, discovered the Animation Show of Shows by chance. He went to the film screening to break the monotony of searching for something to stream or watch online. Though he doesn’t have experience with animation, Stolier appreciated the individuality and creativity represented in the short films.

“It was nice to see a variety of different perspectives and to step out of the comfort zone of just scrolling around Netflix and finding something to watch,” Stolier said. “There’s so much content that’s just automatically served to us with algorithms and things like that, and I think it’s liberating in a way to try to find opportunities to see things that are more curated by people.”