About the Artist:
I am an animator specializing in hand drawn animation. I became interested in this artistic medium following my research on the early Disney films back in high school. I plan to work at either an animation studio or as a freelance animator working on private commissions.
https://manningeliam.wixsite.com/mysite/current-project-updates
Insta @manning311
The End of What Used to Be
Video, 2020, 1080p/4 min
My thesis project, “The End of What Used to Be," is a short story of two elemental spirits in love but forever doomed to remain apart. The story is structured in the vein of creation myths providing the origins of natural phenomena. Much of mythology would usually anthropomorphize natural forces and involve them in very human conflicts causing said phenomena. The two spirits involved in my story are the Moon and the Earth. At one time in the distant past, these spirits were one, but a catastrophic event (Impact theory: a dwarf planet colliding with Earth causing the formation of our moon) breaks them apart. As a result, the Earth and Moon are caught in a desperate struggle to return to one another. In response, the Earth lashes out using violent volcanic eruptions to bridge the divide between them. Unfortunately, they are doomed to be apart as the distance separating them is too far to cross. While not explicitly accurate to the real forces behind the natural phenomena, like myths of old, the story incidentally describes very accurately a facet of the human condition.
This story is a deeply personal one. The story involves a love not compromised by incompatibility but rather circumstance, a love that could've been but was condemned by unseen forces. It's a story tied inextricably to the personal story of the first person I ever came to love romantically. I use this piece not only as a therapeutic outlet to describe these intangible feelings using allegory, but also as an outlet for anyone sharing these feelings to know that unlike these spirits, they are not alone.