Court in Session: OIAF 2025 Jury Unveiled!

– The Ottawa International Animation Festival (OIAF) has announced its esteemed jury members for the 2025 event, featuring celebrated animation gurus like Winston Hacking and Chris Lavis.
– The Short Film Jury combines the creative wisdom of Canadian animator Winston Hacking, winding up with Gina Kamentsky from the US and Phil Mulloy from the UK. Let’s hope they keep their 3D glasses at arm’s reach!
– Meanwhile, the Feature Film Jury comprises Adventureland’s Dr. Magdelena Zira from Cyprus, Chris Lavis (who was poached from Canada’s impressive talent pool), and Honami Yano from Japan. A global ensemble of animation enthusiasts, indeed!
– These prioritized individuals will be a captive audience to OIAF Official Selections, painstakingly assessing each entrant during the Festival, to figure out the cream of the crop.

In my hot take: It’s like the animation world’s flavourful version of Jury Duty! But instead of dry court proceedings, you have an explosion of animations dished up from some of the most creative doodling minds at the OIAF. And instead of the drawn-out courtroom drama, there’s an international cavalcade of jury members shipping in from Canada, the U.S, UK, Cyprus, and Japan. Talk about a United Nations of Animation! The OIAF 2025 promises to be as interesting in the judge’s corner as it will be on screen. So set those popcorn makers on full blast and prepare for a showcase that’s anything but sketchy!

Discover the acclaimed jury lineup for the 2025 edition of the legendary Ottawa International Animation Festival (OIAF). This star-studded panel includes renowned Canadian animators Winston Hacking and Chris Lavis. The international short film jury panel consists of seasoned jury members like Hacking, Gina Kamentsky (USA) and Phil Mulloy (UK), while the feature film jury panel comprises of Dr. Magdelena Zira (Cyprus), Lavis, and Honami Yano (Japan). These esteemed juries will spotlight the best OIAF Official Selections at the Award Ceremony due to take place on September 27, 2025, at the iconic National Arts Centre.

“The assembly of an ideal jury is like crafting the perfect dish, it’s all about getting the right mix of ingredients. This year, we bring together the world’s top-tier independent animation artists, many of whom are festival favorites,” explains OIAF Artistic Director Chris Robinson. “We’re proud to include Winston Hacking, the Milan of collage, and Chris Lavis, who forms one-half of the prodigious Clyde Henry team, in our Canadian contingent.”

Alumnus of the Sheridan College Media Arts program, Hacking is notably acclaimed for repurposing found footage and photography via compositing and stop-motion animation. His music video directorial renditions for artists such as Flying Lotus, Andy Shauf, and Run The Jewels have made waves at various festivals and international microcinemas.

Lavis’s debut film, Madame Tutli-Putli (2007), co-created with Maciek Szczerbowski, was graced with an Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Short Film in 2008. The enduring partnership under the Clyde Henry banner birthed creations like Higglety Pigglety Pop! or There Must Be More to Life (2010) and Gymnasia (2019). Their latest venture with National Film Board of Canada, The Girl Who Cried Pearls (2025), was chosen as the curtain raiser film for the 2025 Annecy International Animation Festival.

“Our festival’s long-standing goal is to showcase a culturally diverse and gender-balanced jury panel comprising experts from both commercial and independent animation spheres. We strive to present an unbiased jury that truly appreciates the whole range of animation creativity,” states Robinson. “I’m particularly pleased to bring onboard Magdalena Zira, known for her valuable animation insights and her broad perspective gained from her work as an academic, theatre director, and writer will lend richness to our OIAF discussions.”

In the Short Film jury panel, the expertise of Hacking is balanced by the knowledge of Kamentsky and Mulloy. Kamentsky, an animator, kinetic sculptor, and sound artist, boasts an impressive career spanning over three decades with mastery in different forms of art including painting, drawing, film collage, rotoscope, and more. Mulloy, transitioning from live-action films, created a uniquely identifiable minimalist animation style that is grotesquely humorous. He is famed for his trilogy Intolerance 1, 2, 3 (2000-2004), series Cowboys (1991) and The Ten Commandments (1994-1996), and his groundbreaking Christies series (2006, 2010, 2011) that bagged an unprecedented trio of Grand Prizes for Best Animated Feature at OIAF.

The Feature Film jury panel assembles the talents of Zira,Yano, and Lavis. Zira is a theatre director and classics scholar who has been an artistic collaborator of Animafest Cyprus since 2012. Yano, an alumnus of Rhode Island School of Design, is a graduate from Tokyo University of the Arts under Koji Yamamura, and has made significant contributions to independent animation. Her post-graduate production, A Bite of Bone (2021), was honored with the Grand Prize for Short Animation at the 45th OIAF.

You can submit your entries for OIAF until May 31, 2025, 11:59 pm ET. The submission is fee-free. If selected for the Official Competition, your animated works will have the honor of being screened during the festival before the juries and will be eligible for awards.