Last week I had the chance to visit Eric Steegstra in his studio. The first thing I noticed when I stepped into Eric’s studio was an astonishing level of tidiness. I think most animators who work with traditional tools can agree with me if I say, that this profession turns you into somewhat of a hoarder. You try to save and recycle as much of the set and equipment you can, until one day you find yourself entangled in a pool of uncategorized cables, textiles and puppet legs.
In Eric’s studio on the other hand, everything is carefully organized and labelled – I had the impression that even I could find whatever I need without instructions. Here, everything is optimized, and everything is set up in the most economic way. *
The stars of the studio are obviously the puppets, who are going through various adventures in the middle of the set. Eric doesn’t even need to touch them: the puppets can be moved through an intricate system of pulleys and strings.
Eric’s animations toured several film and animation festivals, won international prizes, they got even broadcasted by television stations. You would never suspect that he is a self-taught animator and does all parts of the production process himself: he writes the story, makes the puppets, builds the set, shoots and edits the movie. He even records some of the voice footage himself, even if that means standing in a storm, waiting for the sound of the perfect thunder.
He used to have a full-time job until he retired recently: he was a male nurse working night shifts at a local hospital. Still, his spare time passion has always been puppetry and animation. He came up with visual stories since he can remember.
Eric’s animations operate with voice and gesture only. There is no dialogue, no narration, no explanation. “Besides movement, my favourite tool to play with are shadows” he says. “You can express a lot by setting up the lights right. Shadows create different moods. It also helps you to create depth in the scene and you can influence where the viewers direct their attention. I also use ambiguity in my storytelling. Things become more interesting, when the viewers need to use their imagination too.”
Currently he’s working on his biggest project so far: an adaptation of the Victor Hugo Novel Notre-Dame de Paris. “I’ve been planning to create this animation since my teenage years.” He says. “I think there is more to the story than the basic ‘beauty and the beast’ interpretation we’ve seen in the Disney version. I want to dig deeper in the story and show the personal motivations and history of the characters. All characters have a rich multi-faceted personality, and it’s an exciting challenge to explore their motivation without dialogues.”
He talks openly about his process and shows me some studio tricks I’m curious about. “My wife, Pauline helped me with the storyboard, and in some scenes my friends assist me by moving the puppets.”
I ask him about his biggest inspirations. “I grew up with and was very influenced by the great Czech animators like Jiří Trnka, Karel Zeman and Jan Švankmajer. From Russian artists I like Ladislas Starevich and Yuri Norstein. I’m also a big fan of the Quay brothers and Norman McLaren.”
When I ask him how long he thinks his current production will take he smiles: “It will take long, probably years. But I’m happy that now I can devote the project as much time as it needs, and I’m in no rush to finish.”
I must say that I left the studio deeply impressed by the amount of experience and dedication I saw there. I tend to rush things and I’m frequently impatient about my working process. Eventually all the experimentation I invest in my animation project pays off in the end. It was also encouraging to see how much experience you can culminate on your own if you stick to the craft.
If you’d like to see Eric’s animations and behind the scene shots about his current project, visit his website:
Eric added the correction here that even though his studio is indeed "reasonably well organized”, often it looks like a war zone, especially when he’s searching and experimenting. I’m still not sure if we can believe him though.