The Birthday

This MAA paper examines the relationship between my animation and character design artwork and the autobiographic elements that inform these works. I will document my evolving creative process as I worked on a semi-autobiographic fairy tale called The Birthday, a ctionalized self portrait that depicts my mental state in dealing with an identity crisis I experienced as a new Canadian immigrant in the mid 1980s. This paper will draw parallels between the fairy tale I created and my personal experience by touching on cultural and social issues that have shaped my philosophy. I will reference authors whose analytical works on fairy tales and myths have informed my storytelling process, in particular Bruno Bettelheim and Joseph Campbell. I will also examine the role of the subconscious and the Jungian archetypes in my fairy tale and at the same time explore possible connections between my own character and the characters that I have designed. The scope of this paper does not allow for an in-depth analysis of my book project, but by introducing some psychological concepts used by Jung, Bettelheim and Campbell in their discussion of myths and fairy tales into my work, I hope to gain a better understanding of my creative process, which will help build the foundation for my future projects. Finally, I also want to reach out to my audience by highlighting universal themes that the project addresses.