Bulgaria-born illustrator, graphic designer, director and animator, Theodore Ushev has long become award-winning festival favorite. In this retrospective program, you will be introduced to his most prominent works, from BLOOD MANIFESTO, a violent political statement painted in his own blood, to the Academy Award-nominated short film BLIND VAYSHA, and experience the unique mix of Slavic origins and Canadian influence.
BLIND VAYSHA
Theodore Ushev
Canada / 2016, 8 min
The tale of a girl who could see the past and the future simultaneously and respectively with each eye, but never the present.
TOWER BAWHER
Theodore Ushev
Canada / 2006, 3 min
A salute to Russian constructivist art.
TZARITZA
Theodore Ushev
Canada / 2007, 7 min
This animated short by Theodore Ushev combines warmth, humour and magic in a story about a young girl who misses her grandmother. When Lili finds a tzaritza (magic shell) along the seashore, she hatches a plan to bring her Grandma from Bulgaria to Montreal to make her father happy.
GLORIA VICTORIA
Theodore Ushev
Canada / 2013, 7 min
Recycling elements of surrealism and cubism, this animated short by Theodore Ushev focuses on the relationship between art and war. Propelled by the exalting "invasion" theme from Shostakovich's Leningrad Symphony (No. 7), the film presents imagery of combat fronts and massacres, leading us from Dresden to Guernica, from the Spanish Civil War to Star Wars. It is at once a symphony that serves the war machine, that stirs the masses, and art that mourns the dead, voices its outrage and calls for peace.
BLOOD MANIFESTO
Theodore Ushev
Canada / 2016, 2 min
Director Theodore Ushev uses his own blood to animate struggles with injustice in the world.
LIPSETT DIARIES
Theodore Ushev
Canada / 2010, 14 min
A descent into the maelstrom of anguish that tormented Arthur Lipsett, a famed Canadian experimental filmmaker who died at 49.
THE PHYSICS OF SORROW
Theodore Ushev
Canada / 2019, 27 min
A saga of childhood reveries and adult regrets that is also the first-ever fully animated film using encaustic painting.