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5 unusual facts about Norman McLaren


Moustapha Alassane

Jean Rouch allows Alassane’s education and accommodation in Canada, where he meets the famous Norman McLaren, who teaches him the secrets of animation.

Norman McLaren

Raphaël Bassan, "Norman McLaren : le silence de Prométhée", in Les Cahiers de Paris expérimental, no 17 (in French) (2004)*

Studio A, the NFB's first animation studio, formally came into existence as of January 1943, with McLaren as its head.

In 2009, McLaren's works were added to UNESCO's Memory of the World Programme, listing the most significant documentary heritage collections in the world, joining such works as the Gutenberg Bible and The Wizard of Oz.

Saint-Laurent, Quebec

The Norman-McLaren district is named for Norman McLaren, a cinema pioneer at the National Film Board of Canada, whose headquarters are located in the borough district.


Drawn-on-film animation

The first and best known practictioners of drawn-on-film animation include Len Lye, Norman McLaren, Stan Brakhage, then later artists including Steven Woloshen, Richard R. Reeves and Baerbel Neubauer, who produced numerous animated films using these methods.

Fernando Meirelles

At 13, with a borrowed Super 8 camera, Meirelles started producing small films, inspired by Norman McLaren's animations.

How Wings Are Attached to the Backs of Angels

Welch has stated that one of the original influences for the film was Arnold Böcklin's painting Isle of the Dead as well as Norman McLaren's 1946 NFB animated short A Little Phantasy on a 19th-century Painting, which incorporates the Böcklin work.

Impakt Festival

During the 2000s editions works from Annika Larsson, Magnus Wallin, Norman McLaren, Reynold Reynolds were screened at Impakt Festival.

Sharon Louden

During this program Louden's multiple animations were screened with other notable works, such as: "Lines Horizontal" Norman McLaren, 1962 ; "Two Space" Larry Cuba, 1979 ; "Free Radicals" Len Lye, 1958 ; "Symphonie Diagonal" Viking Eggeling, 1924 ; "Silence" Jules Engel,1968 ; and "Chemical Sundown" by Jeremy Blake, 2001 to name only a few.


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