Mount Waverley never looked so cool
Mary and Max
Step inside the marvellous miniature world of Mary and Max.
Technically, the works that Melbourne-based animator Adam Elliot creates are what you'd call stop-motion or claymation films. But, according to Adam, they're 'clayographies' - that is, clay-animated biographies.
Winner of the 2004 Academy Award for Best Short Animation (for Harvie Krumpet), Adam has co-curated a special exhibition that goes behind the scenes of Mary and Max, his first feature-length 'clayography'. Mary and Max: The Exhibition is a fascinating and ultimately beautiful showcase of character models, hand-drawn storyboards, meticulously crafted miniature props and footage of Adam and his talented team of animators at work.
Spanning 20 years and two continents, Mary and Max tells the story of a pen-pal relationship between two very different people: Mary Dinkle, a lonely 8-year-old girl living in suburban Melbourne (Mount Waverley to be exact), and Max Horowitz, an obese 44-year-old Jewish man with Asperger's Syndrome living in New York City.
After five years and countless painstaking hours of hard yakka, Adam was rewarded for his efforts when Mary and Max premiered as the opening night film at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival - the first ever animated film to do so.
This free exhibition is open daily from 10am to 6pm, and is a chance to see, as Adam says, "all the things that have been pouring out of my head for years".
See the photos from opening night.
Win!
For your chance to win an exclusive photographic print from Mary and Max signed by Adam Elliot, enter our Mary and Max: Create a Character Competition. Simply create your own plasticine character, photograph it and send it in to our online gallery. The entry that most captures our judges' imagination scores the prize!
Published Thursday, 4 March 2010
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