During this edition of the KLIK! Amsterdam Animation Festival, a Symposium discussing the combination of science and animation will take place. Seven speakers, from astrophysicists to philosophers and animators, will cover the various ways in which these two different fields collaborate or clash. Check out our program:

Sunday 19 September / UvA / 13:00

12:45 Entry

13:00 Film: Quantum Quest

This film does not just contain vast amounts of real and exclusive space imagery: the film’s director is a scientist himself! Harry Kloor hopes his science fiction will turn a wider audience on to science.



14:00 Break

14:15 Film: Outside the Box / Joseph Pelling

In this playful short, two intellectuals pretentiously brag about their reasoning techniques. An entertaining and hopefully not too-apt film to kickstart the symposium.

Introduction by Yvonne van Ulden from the Utrecht School of the Arts

Experiment by Valentijn Visch from the University of Delft

Visch will test alternative ways of enhancing film’s emotional effect on the viewer.

Films:

• Nature by Numbers / Cristóbal Vila

Science is not too often depicted as elegantly as in this film’s comprehensible explanation of the golden ratio. Who needs more than four minutes to convey this much information this clearly? Not Cristóbal Vila.

• Fauna Sutra / Johan Klungel

The director quirkily plays with the facts of documentary audio footage on the mating behavior of marine life. Leaving the audio intact, the fishy performances of his human characters are all the more transformative.

• Is 1 Plus 1 Altijd 2? / Coen Rens & Elte Hartland

Logical reasoning alone does not ensure you are always right. This much we learn through this Wisebit, which was designed to playfully make teens think about philosophy and science.

Lecture by Charles Forceville from the UvA: ‘Animating Scientific Facts’

Can the medium of animation do justice to a more or less “objective” reality?

Lecture by Valentijn Visch: ‘How we get immersed in animated emotions’

How does animation engage our emotions?

On Wisebits: Holland's animated philosophy series; a dialogue between Bas Haring & Johan Klungel.

A philosopher and an animator discuss Wisebits.

15:45 Break

16:15 Films:

• They Might Be Giants: Science Is Real / David Cowles & Andy Kennedy

Science has probably never sounded as catchy as in Cowles and Kennedy’s vibrant video for They Might Be Giants. And this is but one of many!

• Sackler Lab – Sterrenwacht Leiden / Peter Prys

What medium other than animation can map space as fluently as Prys’ film for Sterrewacht Leiden? Let us know if you have the answer.

• LOFAR / Peter Prys

This explanatory animation from Prys finds him illustrating the first —and probably most expansive— highly sensitive radio telescope system of its kind.

Lecture by Harold Linnartz: ‘Science Vision, Science Fiction or Science Friction’

On animation's uses and its short-comings.

Films:

• Rexin-G Mechanism of Action / Hybrid Medical Animation

A tumor-targeted nanoparticle delivers its designer tumor-killing gene. SciFi action on a microscopic scale.

• Corpus Hersenen / Studio Lemonade

An interesting choice made here is the layering of live-action footage on top of the animation. Its design communicates both ‘real’ thoughts (live-action) and impulses in the brain (animation).

• The Whole Brain Catalog / Mark Ellisman & Drew Berry

Starting with a mouse’s skull, the film delves deep into the parts and processes of its brain, aptly ending with the phrase “To be continued…”, laying bare the ongoing quest that is science.

Lecture by Koen Pieterse: ‘Animation As a Tool For Scientists: Opportunities and Dilemmas’

The choices a scientific animation studio deal with when working with scientists as a target group?

Film:

Towards a Living Artificial Kidney / ICMS Animation Studio

As an animation studio surrounded and led by scientists, ICMS combine accuracy and communication. Here they dynamically zoom in on the cultivation of an artificial kidney.

Lecture by Harry Kloor and Rayna Napali: ‘The Process Behind Quantum Quest,’ (NASA/JPL)

Animation can be both illustrative and inspirational.

17:45 Break

18:00 Films:

• Metalosis Maligna / Floris Kaayk

Like Klungel’s, this is a graduation film that mocks the documentary genre. Unlike Klungel, Kaayk deceives the viewer into thinking it is real. When you realize it is all fiction, the joke is already on you.

• The Inner Life of the Cell / XVIVO

Besides winning awards and inspiring others to create scientific animations (including ICMS) through this film, XVIVO remind us just how big the incredibly tiny is when seen in close-up.

• A New Antioxidant System Protects Single Cysteine / Joris Messens

What is particularly interesting about this controversial film is its highly specific focus on its subject. It also produces very effective publicity for scientist Messens’ publication.

• James, The Inside Story of a Prescription Drug / Denis van Waerebeke

This inventive take on the lengthy and complex process of the production and patenting of prescription drugs is about as condensed as it can get. It is also lively and informative for all ages!

• Duelity / Marcos Ceravolo & Ryan Uhrich

This film could not have a more apt title. The accuracy with which the pun addresses both dualism and the dialogue between science and religion, however, cannot even describe Duelity’s splitting of hemispheres.

Debate featuring all speakers plus film makers Peter Prys and Floris Kaayk

Join our speakers in a discussion on the friction between design and content!

19:00 End

[email protected]

Location Symposium: UvA Roetersstraat 15 Amsterdam

Ticket Service: Kriterion Roetersstraat 170 Amsterdam

Buy a Symposium Pass September 19 CLICK here!!