Cuban animators featured at art SRJC, Schulz museum

Santa Rosa Junior College’s 3D Animation Program, in collaboration with the Art Department and the Charles M. Schulz Museum, will host three renowned animators from Cuba: Mario Rivas, Daniel Rivas and Manuel Guerra. The event will include a lecture by the animators and a reception on Sept. 14 at SRJC’s Santa Rosa campus. Both the presentation and the gallery reception will be open to all students and the general public at no charge and will begin at noon. Parking permits are required and available daily on campus lots.

The two-part event will begin at noon with a lecture from the animators in Newman Auditorium. Following the lecture, the Art and Applied Technology departments will host a reception for the animators at the Robert F. Agrella Art Gallery (located on the first floor of the Frank P. Doyle Library) at 1:30 p.m. The lecture will also be video-conferenced to room 602 of the Richard W. Call Building on the college’s Petaluma campus.

On Sept. 12, the Charles M. Schulz Museum will include a free 2-hour workshop from 10 a.m. to noon on animation. Children ages 10–12 interested in animation are encouraged to attend and learn how to make an animation from start to finish. Advance reservations are required and can be reserved online at www.schulzmuseum.org/learn/classes-camps or by calling 284-1272.

At 3 p.m., the animators will show some short examples of their work, and talk about animation, storytelling and art training in Cuba. Both of these are free events.

Mario Rivas is an acknowledged master of Cuban animation. He has more than 30 years of experience as an animation director, with a career spanning a wide range of topics and themes. He made his debut in the 1970s as the Cuban animation industry was first developing projects aimed at children and adolescents.

His popular series on the genius girl detective Fernanda Largo was developed in concert with his son Daniel Rivas. The series includes more than 20 episodic shorts and the 2014 feature film “Fernanda and the Strange Case of Doctor X and Mister Jai.” This film was the first Cuban feature to be entirely produced digitally.

Guerra has more than a decade of experience as an animator in Cuba. He has worked on a variety of animations for the Cuban Institute of Cinematographic Art and Industry. Guerra was a presenter at Comicdom Con Athens in 2011.

SRJC’s 3D Animation Program provides a 2-year certificate and AS degree, and is part of the Applied Technology Department.