Conversations with a Whale – Anna Samo Interview | I’M FINE! – UK/Ukraine Season
As filmmakers, many of us have had our fair share of rejections; from festival submissions to unsuccessful pitches. This is exactly the kind of rejection that Anna Samo’s short film Conversations with a Whale deals with, which made it a poignant addition to the I’m FINE! programme.
As a collaboration between Skwigly and Ukraine’s LINOLEUM festival, I’M FINE! is a project that focuses on the ways to maintain mental health and stay motivated and productive in a world that changes every minute.
The programme itself is a reflection on the emotional burnout from the best independent animation creators. In addition to animation film screenings, Skwigly will be featuring a series of interviews and podcasts with artists who share their experiences of going through emotional burnout. Today we present a conversation with Anna Samo about her 2020 short, Conversations with a Whale; a film described as a ‘love letter to artists, their art and its audience’.
Could you introduce yourself and describe briefly the circumstances of how the film was made or where it came from?
The initial impulse to make this film, was that my debut film was rejected by almost every festival there is. I was so spoiled with being quite a successful that I felt that something was really wrong with me and with my art.
Over the years I felt like I just need to change how I work and my creative process; and this one was an attempt to do that. On one hand, it deals with all the rejections and how we, as artists, are somewhat dependent on other people seeing our work and other people appreciating what we do. But on the other hand, balancing it with why we actually do it. And it’s, it’s my love letter to animation.
Going into the process, do you find that the process of animation, filmmaking, or other kind of areas around it, has any kind of therapeutic value in and of itself?
I often get this question in relation to this particular film – if it was therapeutic or not – because I did have a really bad time after being rejected [with] self-doubt. For me, in this particular case, making the film wasn’t the therapy, it was putting the shifting filter process of thinking [that] happened before. Then there was a process of making the film, which was an adventure of itself.
My work is an extension of my thought process and of my life and, in a way, a filter. You see the world, you get the signals, and then you signal something back through the time that you spent in the studio. I think also because it takes such a long time – especially if you’re working under the camera a lot – for me, it was valuable to think about what I’m actually spending my time on. There’s so much time that I spend on it, I want to make this process more enjoyable. That was actually the little goal that I that I put in front of me to achieve with this film. So yeah, maybe in a way, it was therapeutic in this sense.
It’s usual to work to deadlines, either for clients and employers; or if you’re working on your own projects you may have a self-imposed deadline. Do deadlines have a positive or negative impact on how you structure your time in approaching a creative project?
I love deadlines even though I always break them; but to have them is something that is essential because otherwise you get into this limbo of making things even more and more perfect – and sometimes [this is] really wrong. Sometimes you just have to say, “Okay, I’m making it” – especially if you work alone. You just have to be forced to make a decision right then and not to postpone it to the next year.
Conversations with a Whale
The pandemic has affected many people’s mood and life; as did the lockdown situation. Were you adversely affected by lockdown – or have there been any other times of crisis you’ve experienced – that presented personal challenges to your mood, mental health or motivation to create artistic work? And was there anything you sort of actively did to kind of help overcome that?
At the beginning of pandemic, I felt like ‘Oh, everybody, welcome to my world!’. You’re sitting at home and doing your stuff now, alone. But of course, it’s taking its toll in the way that you are connected to the world. There was the time where I felt like, not only was I feeling miserable, but everybody else also affects your mood.
For me, personally, right now is an even more challenging time because I originally come from Russia, and what is happening right now is really just putting everything in question. I started the project I was working on – it grew out of this pandemic feeling – and then the war started. And I was like, ‘Why is this relevant at all? Why am I doing this?’ But this is a good thing, because it’s something that you have to think about and, as an artist, you don’t live in an absolute little bubble. You are connected to what is happening right now.
Just to figure out how to balance this actuality and something that is timeless has become one of the premises for the film that I’m doing right now. So it’s kind of this constant question and response. But of course, for like, a couple of weeks, I was knocked out and I couldn’t do anything at all.
An issue that I’m seeing come up a lot, especially with animators coming into the industry now, is grappling with burnout. I was wondering if that’s something you had ever experienced and if so, what sort of self-maintenance did you undergo to move through it and carry on?
I never had a burnout but I’m constantly dealing with stuff like self-doubt and light depressions that do become obstacles in my work. I have developed some strategies to overcome this by recognizing that the ‘hole’ is coming close, and by doing some activities that helped me get out of it. For example, I have a hobby of playing trumpet or just doing something that is not connected in any way to your daily work.
My other problem is that I work alone and I don’t see many people. So I started really working on getting out and seeing people, other than parents and school, but for me it is work because you have to reach out, you have to make yourself go to events, you have to organize a babysitter, you have to do this, you have to do that… It is much easier not to [do it] but it ends up taking a toll on my wellbeing. So over a couple of years I have developed this strategy to work around it because otherwise it’s just not productive.
Conversations with a Whale
Anna Samo’s film Conversations with a Whale is part of the I’m FINE! animation screening that will be taking place at:
- Chichester International Film Festival – 27 August (UK)
- Bolton International Film Festival – 7 October (UK)
- LINOLEUM International Contemporary Animation and Media Art Festival – 7-11 September (Online, geo-blocked to Ukraine)
- MEGOGO screening – 10-30 October (Online, geo-blocked to UK and Ukraine)
I’M FINE! is a project by the LINOLEUM Contemporary Animation and Media Art Festival and Skwigly Animation Magazine. It is implemented with the support of the British Council within the framework of the UK/Ukraine Season of Culture.