ART OF LIXIAN CHEN
GANYMEDE
Surrealism | Fantasy | 4m 10s | 2021
The sad sculptor, in his dream, got the love he admired. This is a legend about ancient Greece. The protagonist of the story is a young man named Ganymede.
Photography | Jung-Yu Chang
Music | Yu-Fang Hsu
CONCEPT DESIGN
About Ganymede
Ganymede is a young boy in an ancient Greek mythology. He is also one of the sons of Trojan king Tros. One day, his handsome beauty attracted the attention of Zeus. So Zeus turned into a huge eagle and came to Mount Ida to take the boy away.
This animated short is mainly based on the stories of "Pederasty in ancient Greece" and "Ganymede".
Young Boy
The boy in the story is an image, from the sculptor's fantasy or dream. At the moment when the sculptor saw the boy, the boy danced beautifully, so I tried to use different media to present the boy's posture and artistic conception, just like a dream.
Sculptor | Old man
The role of the old man is set as a talented sculptor, but he always shows a melancholy and sad expression, because he has always been dissatisfied with his works. He longs for the innocent teenage love that Zeus had for Ganymede, and wants to This form of love manifested in his carvings until he saw a dancing boy in a crevice of uncarved stone.
Storyboard
Experiment
Ganymede is an animation revolving around "reality" and "dreams". As the plot unfolds, reality and dreams gradually overlap and come together again. There is no accurate answer to whether what the old man finally sees is real. In order to present two different worlds, the "reality" uses digital painting, while the "dream" uses different media to present the illusory feeling. The main media are crayons, watercolors and ink. Finally, when these media are combined with digital painting The time is to express the union of the two worlds.
It can be said that this animation is also an experimental short film.
“The short film trial screen at the beginning of the animation”
