I thought I would just stop by to share my experiences at the Year 3 & 4 Graduation Show and Showcase of the Year 2 Animation/Concept Art/Illustration.

Another year has passed by so quickly, and I hope all you current students at Max had a successful year. As well, to all teachers, I hope you all had an enjoyable year teaching and hope to see you back in September.

I would just like to share with you all my experience at this year’s graduation show for the 3rd year and 4th year students. First and foremost, I would like to congratulate this year’s graduating class, wish them all the best and luck in their future endeavors. To all the graduating 3rd year students, it was a pleasure entering the school at the same time as you, and I am truly impressed by the hard work you put in your final films, even though you only had 3 weeks to put it all together. Kudos.

To the 4th year students, I was truly in awe at all of your 3D projects on display in the theater, especially the short films you all produced. The quality of work produced just blew me away. If you can, I urge you all in this group to go to the school to see the films that were produced. Sitting in there watching both 3rd and 4 year films, along with newly graduate and close friend, Richard Truong, gave me an excitement and inspiration into creating my own short film. I can’t wait to produce mine!

The 2nd Year Showcase was just as awe-inspiring as watching the films. The level of quality in the 2nd year’s was totally beyond what I had expected. Just the amount of work displayed from all 3 programs was enough to keep me at school for hours ( I had arrived at 5PM), to just look through the student work. It was that much!

I encourage all students who have finished year 1, and those of you who are about to attend Max the Mutt, to go to the Open House and get a preview of work you will produce in Year 2 and Year 3.

Aside from that, I hope you all keep doing what you love to do, which is DRAW (DUH!), party hard, but have a safe summer. And to the recent grads, all the best!

~Daniel Racelis
(Year 2 Animation Student)

The first things that enter my mind in reference to “What’s different about Max the Mutt?”  are community and professional integrity.  We are a good school for passionate, hardworking individuals who care about quality.  Many of our instructors were born and educated abroad, and still have a passion for  the craft of traditional art that is sometimes missing in academic institutions in North America.

Those of us who were trained in North America are individuals who searched and scrambled to develop ourselves beyond the limits of the curriculum we were offered.  We tried to develop programs that we wish we’d had!  We find that we can now teach in several years, through a well thought-out curriculum, what it took us as individuals much longer to achieve.  There was genuine excitement among the faculty when we saw the work our students produced this year.

The point of art school is to teach basic skills, to empower individuals so that they can both communicate their creative visions,  and continue to grow as artists. To that end, we continue, with humility,  to be self-critical and will always review programs and try to improve. The process of education is, of course, also dependent on the attitude of our students and their ability to apply themselves to difficult tasks.

I find this undertaking as difficult as my efforts to keep evolving as an artist. In fact,  it seems to me that education really is an art. It  requires  knowledge, skill, passion and humility.  Maybe we can say that about anything we want to do very well.  If we don’t want to sink into mediocrity, we have to care,  and continue to care, very much about what we are doing.  I think that perhaps this is an easier state to maintain in a small, artist run community than it would be in a larger institution.

Do come to see the graduate show and share your reactions with us.

Enjoy the video from the Year 1 Opening!

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I often post on AWN, and the last time I posted I gave the link to the video of the first year show on You Tube.  I want to share with you a reply to that post from Larry Lauria, a very experienced and respected animator and instructor. Check out his blog!

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Wonderful!