Abstract
Drawing, words, photography, and animation, when mixed together, have the potential to affect a viewer on a conscious level, while also immersing the viewer in the past. This is an important observation in relation to Robert Breer’s animated films, and this chapter focuses in particular upon Bang! (1986) and What Goes Up (2003). Visceral mark-making, rhythm, and movement are all integral elements in the developmental stages that precede language, and any echoes of such stages have the potential to reactivate unconscious memories in a viewer. Some comparisons can be made with the flashback and this chapter examines the crucial contribution of the pre-linguistic and symbolic realms to the films’ communicative expression, while also locating certain similarities with the nature of traumatic memory.
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Harris, M. (2020). Drawing on Memory: Layers of Association in Robert Breer’s Animated Films. In: van Gageldonk, M., Munteán, L., Shobeiri, A. (eds) Animation and Memory. Palgrave Animation. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-34888-5_6
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