Podcast interview with Robert Kondo (Tonko House)
In the sixth episode of Independent Animation, our companion podcast series to the Skwigly tie-in book Independent Animation: Developing, Producing and Distributing Your Animated Films (Taylor & Francis/CRC Press), we catch up with Robert Kondo of Tonko House.
Along with co-founder Daisuke ‘Dice’ Tsutsumi, a fellow Art Director at Pixar Animation Studios where the pair worked on such projects as Monsters University, Toy Story 3, Ratatouille and WALL·E between them, Robert would make his mark on the animation industry with the visually stunning independent short film The Dam Keeper, an immediate festival hit and audience favourite that would go on to receive an Oscar nomination.
Following up on the pair’s prior podcast appearance as well as their valuable contributions to the Independent Animation book, in this episode we discuss the work the studio has been up to since Robert and Dice left Pixar to commit to Tonko House full-time. Subsequent projects have included the episodic series Pig: The Dam Keeper Poems, the short film Moom, Schoolism and The Dam Keeper Education Project. We also learn about the stalling of The Dam Keeper feature film, their recently unveiled upcoming projects Oni and Sleepy Pines, what’s on offer at their current exhibition in Seoul and the recent expansion of The Dam Keeper universe into a graphic novel series that has concluded this month with the release of the third and final installment.
Stream below or download here.
For more on the work of Robert Kondo and Dice Tsutsumi visit tonkohouse.com