Claydream (2021)
Directed by Marq Evans
Written by Documentary
Starring Will Vinton, Bill Plympton, Jerry Beck
Release Date August 5th.2022
Streaming Now Streaming on Amazon Prime
Will Vinton was an almost accidental visionary. An artist by trade, Vinton stumbled on to the art of claymation with his friend Bob Gardiner, a visionary in the art of claymation. The pair met in college at the University of California-Berkley and moved to Portland in 1970 where they began their influential collaborations in the basement of Vinton’s home. The collaboration led to a breakthrough in 1974 when Vinton and Gardiner won an Oscar for their animated short, Closed Mondays, about an inebriated man who wanders into a closed art gallery.
Closed Mondays was just the proof of concept the pair needed to launch Will Vinton studios in Portland. Sadly, mental health issues plagued Gardiner and he left the business in 1976 after they’d created their second claymation short. Vinton then took the techniques he learned from Gardiner and combined them with his own talent for innovating camera technology in claymation to create a legacy that has outlived Vinton himself who passed away in 2018.
Find my full length review at Geeks.Media, linked here.
