Ishu Patel

Ishu Patel (born April 20, 1942) is an animation film director/producer and educator. During his twenty-five years at the National Film Board of Canada he developed animation techniques and styles to support his themes and vision. Since then he has produced animated spots for television and has been teaching internationally.[1][2]

Background and Studies

Ishu Patel was born in the State of Gujarat, India.

He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts from M.S.University of Baroda, Gujarat, following which he was accepted into the first cohort of faculty trainees hired at the newly formed National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, Gujarat.

This was an exceptional design school created by the Government of India under the auspices of Mrs. Gandhi and the influential industrialist family of Gautam and Gira Sarabhai. The school was based upon the recommendations and philosophy of the American industrial designers Ray and Charles Eames, as found in The India Report.

During these early years of faculty training, a stream of extraordinary international experts was invited to the National Institute of Design for periods of work and faculty training: Ray and Charles Eames; Buckminster Fuller; Architects Louis Khan and Otto Frie; Furniture Designer George Nakashima; Photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson; Typographer and Designer Adrian Frutiger; Graphic Designers Armin Hoffman, Bob Gill and Ivan Chermayeff; Textile Designers Helena Parhentupa and Alexander Girard; Children's book writer and illustrator Leo Lioni and Animator Gulio Gianini and many others. Of those, Ishu Patel worked most closely with Armin Hoffman, Bob Gill, Adrian Frutiger, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Charles and Ray Eames, Leo Lionni, and Gulio Gianini.

Through a Ford Foundation Grant provided to the National Institute of Design, Ishu Patel was able to finish his post graduate studies in Graphic Design under Armin Hoffman at the Allgemeine Gewerbeschule in Basel, Switzerland, and returned to the National Institute of Design where he taught and became Head of Visual Communications.

Career

A Rockefeller Foundation Scholarship brought Ishu Patel to the National Film Board of Canada to study animation filmmaking for a year, and in 1972 he joined the NFB where, for the next twenty-five years under the NFB mandate Ishu Patel produced and directed animated films and mentored young animation filmmakers.

There he both adapted and originated several notable techniques: in the abstract film Perspectrum he adapted the Norman McLaren technique of multiple passes and variable exposures; the films Afterlife and Top Priority were the result of accidentally discovering, and then developing, the under-lit plasticine technique; for the film Paradise he developed the under-lit pin hole technique with multiple passes; and for The Bead Game he created the procedures for moving thousands of tiny beads under an ever-zooming-outward camera.

He co-produced animation projects with NHK of Japan and Channel Four of Britain, and contributed French language segments to Sesame Street for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

His many international awards include the British Academy Award, two Oscar nominations, the Silver Bear Award at the Berlin Film Festival, Grand Prix at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival, and Grand Prix at the Montreal World Film Festival.[3] He is particularly known for his 1977 film Bead Game which was nominated for an Academy Award.[4][5]

Teaching and Master Classes

Through the National Film Board of Canada Outreach Program Ishu Patel conducted animation workshops with Inuit artists of Cape Dorset, with healthcare fieldworkers in Ghana, and with students in the former Yugoslavia, Korea, Japan and the United States. During those years he returned regularly to Ahmedabad, India where he often taught his approaches and techniques to the animation students at his alma mater the National Institute of Design, and contributed some assistance in formulating the animation program.

After leaving the NFBC he conducted student workshops and Master Classes throughout Asia, mentoring young faculty and developing curricula. He has conducted Master Classes at Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Jerusalem, and the Animation Image Society of Toronto, at the School of Animation, Communication University of China, Beijing, and at the School of Animation, Southwest University of Nationalities, Chengdu, China. Ishu Patel was Special Guest and conducted screenings and a Master Class at the 7th. Big Cartoon Festival in Moscow, Russia, November 2014. He was Visiting Professor at the School of Art, Design and Media, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

Filmography

Awards

Moondust:

Divine Fate:

Paradise/Paradis:

Top Priority:

Afterlife:

Bead Game

Juryships

References

  1. ↑ "National Film Board Key Filmmakers: Ishu Patel". National Film Board. Archived from the original on 14 August 2006. Retrieved 2006-08-20.
  2. ↑ "Academy to Celebrate National Film Board of Canada Anniversary". Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. 1 November 1999. Archived from the original on 18 November 2005. Retrieved 2006-08-20.
  3. ↑ Glassman, Marc (Summer 1997). "United Nations of animation - National Film Board of Canada". Take One. Retrieved 2006-08-20.
  4. ↑ "National Film Board Corridors Open House - Ishu Patel Bead Game". National Film Board. Archived from the original on 15 May 2006. Retrieved 2006-08-20.
  5. ↑ Simensky, Linda (Summer 1997). "O Canada: - Canadian animators". Take One. Retrieved 2006-08-20.

Further reading

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