Gender-based research by Professor Tamsin Bradley and her team are brought to life through animation by a senior lecturer in illustration, Dr Louis Netter.
Dr Louis Netter, Senior Lecturer in the School of Art, Design and Performance at University of Portsmouth.
After a research trip to Mombasa, Kenya in 2019, I worked alongside the ongoing Arts, Heritage, and Resilience in South Sudan (AHRSS) project to help disseminate its findings through animation. Over a period of time, I developed several new techniques and deepened my understanding of the complex social, political and cultural landscape of South Sudan.
Professor Tamsin Bradley’s research looks at violence against women, the plight of women in work, and challenges in post-conflict/displacement zones in Southeast Asia and Africa specifically.
The AHRSS project, led by Professor Bradley, looks at artistic practices, heritage, resilience, and violence against women in the post-conflict setting of South Sudan.
– DR LOUIS NETTER, SENIOR LECTURER IN THE SCHOOL OF ART, DESIGN AND PERFORMANCE
I’d previously worked with Professor Bradley on a Gender South Asia animation that explored the Theory of Change. The animation was aimed at identifying critical support networks for women facing violence and mistreatment in Myanmar, Pakistan, and Nepal. I was eager to explore new ways of telling these important narratives and travel presents rich opportunities for networking and a deeper understanding of the critical context of research projects.
Visualising the landscape of South Sudan
I was approached by Professor Bradley about contributing to the AHRSS project after working together on the Gender South Asia animation. After meeting the South Sudan team and other UK researchers in Mombasa, I developed ideas for films about artistic practices and explored possible visual outputs to best capture the structure and themes of the research project.
The role of the arts in South Sudanese culture
South Sudan is a complex nation that has suffered incredible human upheaval due to war and political instability. It was interesting to see the role the arts play during these turbulent times and how their social, economic, and cultural contribution is critical in the processing of trauma and economic independence for women and men.
What made this further compelling was the nature of that artistic practice, particularly Milaya bed sheets, which, although positively contributing to the lives of women who make them, also reinforces bride price which ultimately condones the ownership of women by their husbands. This positive and negative duality can be captured well in animation which can ably shift between tones, texture, scenes, and settings.
Choosing animation
I eventually decided on animation because of the sensitive nature of the research and the way in which animation can make the specific universal and utilise metaphors for dealing with complexity and sensitive subject matter. The animation was also chosen because of the possibility of multiple techniques, mirroring the diverse artistic practices covered in the project.
The mixed animation method was intentional to explore the different textures of the artistic outputs and to address difficult subjects in a more abstracted, symbolic way, utilising tools that enabled that to happen. The use of stop-frame animation was in part to explore the potential of the medium in connecting to the experience of others, and to create a unique space of sculpted, moveable forms as avatars that stand in for the wider experience of men and women in South Sudan.
The choice of animation was clear because not only is it a highly engaging medium but it can manage the most sensitive material in a way that does not diminish its importance or seriousness.
The choice of animation was clear because not only is it a highly engaging medium but it can manage the most sensitive material in a way that does not diminish its importance or seriousness.
– DR Louis Netter, Senior lecturer in the School of Art, Design and Performance
Like viewing a painting or a drawing, the conceit of the artist, through his or her means, is to render a bridge from the representational to the represented. From the symbol to the source. Irrespective of how this is accomplished and taking into consideration the sensitive approach of most well-meaning artists, this results in a ‘reading’ of the academic findings which is immersive, memorable, and concretised in the forms of animation.
Also, the arts appeal to a wider audience making research findings more accessible to non-academics and stakeholders. Artistic outputs manage to make complexity understandable without diminishing nuance or rigor. These outputs can actually provide new ways of seeing research findings and make conceptual links that may not have been seen or fully comprehended.
If the central subject of the research is lived experience, creative outputs are well suited to vivifying that experience.
– DR Louis Netter, Senior lecturer in the School of Art, Design and Performance
Dr Louis Netter is a senior lecturer in the School of Art, Design and Performance. He has also contributed moving drawings to accompany another project with Professor Tamsin Bradley called ‘Women, work and violence’.