Samantha Moore’s Bloomers nominated for Best Short Film at the British Animation Awards (BAAs)
We are thrilled to announce that Samantha Moore’s experimental animated documentary Bloomers has been nominated for Best Short Film at the British Animation Awards 2020. In celebration of this achievement we are launching the film on Vimeo on 4 March, a week before the BAAs awards announcement.
Bloomers incorporates the materiality of garment manufacturing as it combines more than 14,000 drawings printed onto fabrics, including actual pairs of knickers, made by the workers at the Ella & me lingerie factory in Manchester. The workers also generously supplied the yards of material required, as well as their faces and voices as they recount the history of Ella & me, the UK garment manufacturing industry, and British family traditions of making in the sewing room environment.
Samantha Moore collaborated closely with Swedish composer Malin Bång, who composed an original soundtrack, inspired by the sounds of sewing machinery that she 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.
Bloomers 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
Bloomers won Best British Film at the London International Animation Festival 2019 and 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), both crafted by award-winning artist Elizabeth Hobbs.
Samantha Moore previously collaborated with Animate Projects on the production of Loop in 2016, a film about how scientists imagine their work and how they describe it. The film won Visual Science Award from Imagine Science Abu Dhabi 2017, 2nd Place in the Professional Documentary under 10 minutes category at the Raw Science Film Festival and received a Special Mention: Best Animated Documentary at the Factual Animation Film Fuss 2016.
Bloomers is supported by Klangforum Wien and with public funding by Arts Council England.
