CHARACTER vs. BODY

In this sense, character designers can be said to be playing with incorporeality and lifelessness. In digital images, every highlight sparkling in the characters’ eyes reinforces this absence.

The deformation of bodies in images is perhaps a way of taking revenge on their flatness. The industrial sterility of urban collector toys, the charm of plush dolls are other attempts to escape two dimensionality – fetishes in a Freudian sense, one could argue. All around the world, character designers are being driven to the third dimension so they can finally throw their arms round their own creations.

Behind all these strategies lies the graphical quality of the character, making its powerful emotional connection with the viewer. Pictoplasma is looking for theoretical investigations into life and death, physical presence and absence in the image logic of contemporary character design. (more...)

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