ZAGREB ACADEMY OF VISUAL ARTS OFFERS ANIMATED FILM PROGRAMME AS OF FALL

ZAGREB, July 18 (Hina) - Six students were selected to study animated film at a newly opened department at the Zagreb Academy of Visual Arts. The four-year-long programme should create professionals who will, based on the tradition and talent, be able to offer their own creative products to the competitive international market, the head of the new department, Josko Marusic, told Hina. #L# Thirty-one candidates applied for the programme and 13 of them were selected as finalists. Due to lack of space and application quota of the Zagreb University, only six candidates were selected to attend the programme. The candidates were required to bring scrap books of their drawings, and to take an entrance exam. They were also required to demonstrate abilities of visual art imagination and space composition. Marusic stressed Croatia has many talented young people who needed to be directed to believe in their own creativity. Given that Croatia did not have a school for animated film, students were mostly self-taught. According to Marusic, the programme should be a combination of the classical school of animated film and contemporary animated film production, which serves as computer and video media (3-D, virtual reality). Member of the selection committee Ladislav Galeta stressed that the programme aimed at teaching student to make conventional animation, which would help them earn money, as well as experimental animation, which would enable them to express themselves as artists. In the future, students from out of the country will be able to apply to study at the Academy, Galeta said. The department of animated film was supported by Hubert Sielecki from the Vienna Academy of Applied Arts, who donated equipment worth US$80,000, and the Zagreb Franciscan convent. The opening of the animated film department will place the Zagreb Academy of Visual Arts among 80 colleges in the world which offer animated film programmes in line with the International Animated Film Society. (hina) it