Interview with Alexandre Roy

How did the idea for Tiger, a project that integrates rock music with an experimental film with animation applied directly onto film stock, come about?

Tiger was created during a Kino Kabaret, an event in which the directors must produce a film in a very short time. In this case, the film used a «live» soundtrack of music played (during the screening) by Dumas and his musicians. So, I chose to make an abstract film, with strong visuals to leave a space as large as possible for the music. I improvised directly onto the film stock, while listening to the music of Dumas.

Is drawing on film stock your specialty or do you do other kinds of animation?

Over the past ten years I have explored several animation tech-niques. Tiger is part of an effort to find a technique that would work with the same freedom as painting or sculpture. Indeed, animation is a medium that can be very tedious: each image must be created one at a time, 24 times per second. By treating the film stock as a thin «canvas», it allowed me to work with a freedom of movement that I find particularly liberating.

Norman McLaren was very influenced by the jazz music in his animation work. Is rock music or music in general an inherent part of your practice?

Many experimental animation films use soundtracks with jazz, classical or contemporary music. These are often «serious» or «scholarly» works. I found it interesting the idea of combining music which was much less «clean» for this animation on film stock, where the visual appearance can be quite chaotic and random. I also decided to continue this experiment with Bears and Reptile. These films will also be accompanied by rock soun-dtracks, whose rhythms will serve as links to the chosen animal. I also intend to participate in the composition of the music.

-Vidéographe, 2013