Résumé :
Witnessing acts of transformation and magical performances in the circus ring, audiences are invited to suspend their disbelief as such acts play upon the tensions between truth and deception, as these circus entertainments produce spectacles of wonder. Technologies of cinematic animation have also long produced such encounters between the real and the imagined while acknowledging the constructed nature of the medium. Although early cinema’s connection to the circus has been documented, less has been written about the connections between the circus and technologies of animation. Representations of circus have been present in animation since the medium’s earliest days. In modern times, animatic technologies (those which produce the illusion of movement and of ‘life’) have moved beyond the screen, converging once again with contemporary circus. This chapter examines the connections between early animation technologies and circus, including animated representations of circus. The chapter also draws attention to the new connections between animation and circus, invoking animation as a means to enact wonder—a ‘sleight-of-hand’ that foregrounds its constructed nature, producing an encounter between the real and the imagined.

Localisation : Bibliothèque