'Bloomers' ...nominated for 'Best Short Film' at the British Animation Awards!
Press release: 14 February 2020
Samantha Moore’s 'Bloomers' has been nominated for Best Short Film at the British Animation Awards (BAAs)
Announcement: Thursday 12 March, the BAAs, BFI Southbank, London
Online Launch: Wednesday 4 March, noon, Vimeo
We're thrilled to announce that Samantha Moore’s experimental animated documentary 'Bloomers' has been nominated for a British Animation Award and in celebration of this achievement we're launching the film on Vimeo one week before the BAAs awards announcement.
'Bloomers' incorporates the materiality of garment manufacturing as it combines more than 14,000 drawings printed onto fabric, including actual pairs of knickers, made by the production machinists at the 'Ella & me' lingerie factory in Middleton, Manchester.
Ella & me also generously supplied the material required, as well as their faces & voice overs as they recounted their history in the UK garment manufacturing industry.
Samantha Moore collaborated closely with Swedish composer Malin Bång, who composed an original soundtrack, inspired by the sounds of the factory machinery which were recorded on site. The score is performed by the musicians of renowned Austrian music ensemble Klangforum Wien, who play a traditional sewing machine and a pair of dressmaking scissors as part of their instrumental repertoire.
The film was produced for Klangforum Wien’s Happiness Machine project, which since February 2019 has toured Europe as both a live concert performance and single screen programme, with presentations at ECLAT Contemporary Music Festival, Tricky Women Festival and Annecy Festival amongst others.
“My favourite piece on the programme was 'Bloomers'... The film is a touching window into the everyday working lives of British factory workers.”
‘Happiness Machine Project’, Nancy Denney-Phelps, Animation World Network, March 2019
The film won Best British Film at the London International Animation Festival 2019 & Best Documentary at ReAnima International Animated Film Festival 2019. Its festival screenings include DOC NYC, Encounters Festival, Animest, the McLaren Award programme at Edinburgh International Film Festival, and it is soon to screen at Cardiff Animation Festival and ANIMAC.
The film is currently touring the UK as part of the British Animation Awards Public Choice Programme, as are two other Animate Projects productions The Flounder and I’m OK (co-production with the National Film Board of Canada) crafted by award-winning artist Elizabeth Hobbs.
Bloomers is supported by Klangforum Wien and with public funding by Arts Council England.
Notes to Editors:
Online launch
Wednesday 4 March, noon
Samantha Moore
Sam Moore is an animated documentary maker who is passionate about the ability of animation to convey insights into tricky documentary topics. She has made work about competitive sweet pea growing, phantom limb syndrome, twins and multiple births, audio-visual synaesthesia, micro-biology, archaeological finds, and now the manufacturing of knickers.
Sam’s films have won awards all over the world and she has a Ph.D. (2015) about the way animation can be used to document perceptual brain states, such as phantom limb syndrome and face blindness. Her artistic methodology is based on establishing strong symbiotic working collaborations with the people who are represented in her films, through visual contributions and aural recording.
Samantha is a senior lecturer at the Manchester School of Art and a senior fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy. She guest lectures regularly both in the UK and abroad. samanthamoore.co.uk
Animate Projects (Producer)
Animate works at the intersection of film, art and animation. Led by Abigail Addison and Gary Thomas, since 2007 they have established a reputation for high quality, innovative, experimental and engaging films, and for producing films and projects for exhibition across broadcast, cinema, festival, gallery, public, online and digital platforms. Their awards include Best Film at the Cutting Edge, British Animation Awards 2008, Best Experimental Film, Chicago Underground Film Festival 2011, Lumen Prize 2016 Moving Image Award and a nomination for the BAFTA British Short Animation in 2019. animateprojects.org
Malin Bång (Composer)
Malin Bång’s music is an exploration of movement and energy. She defines her musical material according to their amount of friction and she often incorporates acoustic objects to expand the sound world and to suggest that a musical content can be shaped by anything valuable to the artistic purpose. Malin Bång is a founding member of the Curious Chamber Players. Her works are performed worldwide and recent project has included splinters of ebullient rebellion for the SWR Sinfonieorchester at Donaueschinger Musiktage, the instrumental drama kudzu for CCP at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and Bloomers for Klangforum Wien. Malin Bång is currently composition professor at the Gothenburg Academy of Music and Drama. malinbang.com
Ella & me (Collaborators)
The Ella & me factory was established in 1935 in Middleton on the outskirts of Manchester, by Mary Headen & Eric Quarmby, as a manufacturer of premiere sleepwear & intimate apparel and are still lovingly making garments available online at ellaandme.co.uk
Klangforum Wien (Commissioners)
Klangforum Wien is an Austrian chamber orchestra, based in Vienna at the Konzerthaus, which specialises in contemporary classical music. Founded in 1985, it is run on collective principles, having no official principal conductor. The group is often cited as Austria's leading contemporary music ensemble. klangforum.at
Economy for the Common Good
The Economy for the Common Good advocates a more ethical economic model, in which the wellbeing of people and the environment become the ultimate goal of business. ecogood.org