Vicky Jackson | University of Bristol (original) (raw)
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Journal Articles by Vicky Jackson
The Moving Image Journal, 2015
Interview
The Moving Image Journal, Jul 2015
Journal of British Cinema and Television, Jan 1, 2010
Conference Presentations by Vicky Jackson
This paper will explore animated film advertisements in Britain during the 1930s. Growing academi... more This paper will explore animated film advertisements in Britain during the 1930s. Growing academic attention has been given to non-theatrical film including the advertising film. Films That Sell: Moving Pictures and Advertising was published in 2016, providing the first significant overview of the topic exploring its history, theory and practice. However, such interest has tended to focus on the United States while the British context has received only limited but valuable attention from scholars such as Jez Stewart and Simon Brown and from scholars examining the animators associated with the GPO. This paper will contribute to this growing body of work by mapping key agents in the production of animated advertising films during the 1930s including animators such as Anson Dyer, producers such as Revelations Films, Ltd as well as advertising agents, film distributors and exhibitors in order to identify key industry structures and their influence on the development of British animated advertising films. The paper will include a case study of the film See How They Won (1935) made for Boots the Chemists and animated by Ub Iwerks, former collaborator of Walt Disney, in order to explore the film’s place within the wider advertising industry and the cultural context of the period.
This paper will explore the use of animation in display in Britain during the 1930s as part of a ... more This paper will explore the use of animation in display in Britain during the 1930s as part of a “commercial aesthetic” intended to sell and promote consumer culture. In the 1930s animation could be found most obviously in the cinema where Disney’s Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphony series had become hugely successful. It was also an increasingly popular technique for advertising and instructional films such as the promotional film See How They Won (1935) for Boots chemists. However animated motion was also exploited in other commercial contexts from animated sales aids such as mechanised mannequins found in retail stores, moving displays found in expositions and trade fairs to animated street signs like those found at Piccadilly Circus: ‘The rocket explodes in Piccadilly, the electric wheel spins round…unconsciously we move towards a shop and buy that which we have been so magnificently, with such blazing assurance, encouraged to buy.’ This paper will examine how animated motion was used to sell in the advertising film, in the department store and in electric signs through the creation of desire, novelty and attraction.
This paper will explore the BBC’s attempts to adapt animated film to radio in Britain during the ... more This paper will explore the BBC’s attempts to adapt animated film to radio in Britain during the 1930s and 1940s. During this period the corporation produced several programmes based on the music and characters of animated films as well as adaptations of feature films such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Moreover, they also came to experiment with the intriguing concept of “radio cartoons” which were inspired by the style and content of animated films but were originated for the radio.
In this paper I will outline and explore the BBC’s experiments into the “radio cartoon” in order consider how and why the animated film, seemingly so grounded in visual media, was translated to radio. I will use this point of media convergence to examine how the medium specificity of animation was being formulated and discussed in this period by the BBC and within critical discourse in Britain. Finally I will consider what influence the development of the “radio cartoon” had on British animation?
This paper will draw heavily on a wealth of primary research material from the written archives of the BBC, the trade press, national and local newspapers and magazines such as the BBC’s The Listener.
In this paper I intend to consider Maude Adams as an example of the intermedial influences on col... more In this paper I intend to consider Maude Adams as an example of the intermedial influences on colour in cinema in the early decades of the twentieth century and in particular the 1920s. Adams’s work provides an example of how technological and aesthetic developments in the theatre influenced work on colour in cinema, from the sharing of colour theories and technology to the participation of individuals from the theatre world in colour film production. In the second part of my paper I will consider why Adams became interested in lighting and colour cinema despite her limited technical knowledge. I will argue that Maude’s specialism can be linked to contemporary discourses relating to women and colour.
"This paper will consider the interrelationship of colour, fashion and Technicolor in the 1920s t... more "This paper will consider the interrelationship of colour, fashion and Technicolor in the 1920s through an examination of the intermedial context of colour standardisation and categorisation. The 1920s was a period in which colour was highly 'in vogue'. In the art, advertising, architecture, design and cinema of the jazz age, cultural fascination with colour was lively. Colour was also a subject of intense international debates concerning its artistic, scientific, philosophical and educational significance. Moreover, with the development of new and more accessible dyes, colour was more freely available to be exploited and experimented with. As in the case of cinema where colour was used in a variety of ways. Stencil, tinting and toning, which had been developed for film colouring in the early 1900s, were still frequently used technologies, as were new systems such as Prizma, Technicolor and others.
It was also a decade that saw increased activity around colour standardization and categorisation and moreover efforts to produce a universal colour nomenclature. Colour systems such as the Munsell system were promoted as meanings of measuring and standardising colour. In addition agencies such as America’s National Bureau of Standards were experimenting with the measurement of colour for a range of potential uses (Johnston, 2001). The language used to describe colour was also the focus of research by contemporaries culminating in 1930 in the publication of a Dictionary of Colour. Its purpose was to record all colour names in use up to that time and to provide ‘a record of color words and the particular sensations they identify’ (Maerz and Paul 1930). This desire to control the language of colour provides an interesting antithesis to the main function of colour in fashion. ‘Fashion thrives on novelty and change’ (Arnold, 2009) and colours are one means by which fashion can reinvent itself with each new season. This tension of colour in fashion is present in the world of textile and retail industry. For example, the Textile Color Card Association in America promoted the standardization of colours across the fashion industries as well as predicting and naming colours for the following season for the textile and retail industry (Blaszczyk, 2012). Thus proving there was a desire for both standardisation and variety in the growing consumer culture, resulting in colours becoming commodities.
These intermedial conditions provide an important context to the development and use of colour in film during the decade and in particular the close interrelationship between colour, fashion and film. In order to explore these themes we will limit ourselves to two colours that were 'hot' in the spring of 1926 but were also linked to color films: Alice Blue from Irene (Green, 1926) and Phantom Red from Phantom of the Opera (1925). Both functioned within a remarkable intermedial network, not only were they famous for the use of a Technicolor II inserts but also for their connection to glamorous women. These stars functioned as examples for young girls that were searching for their identity in this ‘jazz age’ or 'années folles'. The paper will explore the history of both colours, their origins and changing meanings, through their interaction with the film they were featured in and the wider world of fashion and beyond. In this way, we hope to provide a better understanding of the meaning and function of colour in connection to cinema and fashion and of the friction between the wish to control and the need to vary in capitalistic consumer culture.
"
Talks by Vicky Jackson
This paper will explore female invention and the cinema between 1898 and 1945, focussing particul... more This paper will explore female invention and the cinema between 1898 and 1945, focussing particularly on technological innovation. I intend to examine the relationship female invertors had with film, the context for their research, the opportunities, problems and solutions they identified and explored rather than focussing simply on those inventions which had a significant impact on the development of cinema. Unfortunately, as is so often the case for women, the presence of female inventors in historical accounts and the surviving archive record is scarce, fragmented and often dismissive. As a result the innovative contribution of women remains relatively unexplored. My research seeks to correct this omission by identifying female inventors and exploring their work in greater detail. In this paper I will outline some of my initial findings and reflect on the difficulties and potentials of the fragmentary history of female invention that is revealed by the surviving archive record. I want to focus particularly on the potentials of the growing digital archive to explore anonymous, forgotten participants of the history of cinema such as these innovative women.
Through a preliminary examination of digitised patent records, trade journals and other sources I have identified 27 female inventors working in and around the cinema demonstrating a small but notable number of women were engaging with technical research in the field.
Thesis Chapters by Vicky Jackson
This thesis is a study of the regional exhibition of Kinemacolor in the UK and USA between 1909 a... more This thesis is a study of the regional exhibition of Kinemacolor in the UK and USA between 1909 and 1916. It considers the extent and role of Kinemacolor in the UK exhibition market. It also introduces the process’s experience in the USA in contrast to that in the UK. In addition it considers more widely the extent of colours films in the UK market and the impact of Kinemacolor on demand for other indexical and non-indexical colour films. The thesis is divided into nine chapters, plus an introduction, conclusion, appendixes and bibliography. Chapter One provides an introduction to the types of colour film in the UK exhibition market and considers the extent of Kinemacolor and other colour films more generally. Chapter Two examines the early distribution and exhibition of Kinemacolor through the Provincial Palaces Limited circuit and the successes and limitations of this arrangement. Chapter Three assesses the distribution of Kinemacolor after Provincial Palaces Limited directly through the Natural Color Kinematograph Limited. Chapter Four considers the changing types of venues to screened Kinemacolor and why these venues were attracted to it. Chapter Five considers promotional material produced by the Natural Color Kinematograph Company Limited to consider exhibitors relationship with the process. Chapter Six looks at a number of case studies as examples of Kinemacolor in the regions. Chapter Seven look at the influence of Kinemacolor on other colour processes and proposes demand for Kinemacolor not only reflected more general interest in other colour systems but also stimulated it. Chapters Eight and Nine conclude the work by examining and comparing the distribution, exhibition and promotion of Kinemacolor in the USA. The thesis reveals the significance of the exhibition of Kinemacolor across the UK, examines the influence of distribution and exhibition issues and the impact Kinemacolor had more widely on colour and the exhibition market.
Papers by Vicky Jackson
The Moving Image Journal, 2015
Interview
The Moving Image Journal, Jul 2015
Journal of British Cinema and Television, Jan 1, 2010
This paper will explore animated film advertisements in Britain during the 1930s. Growing academi... more This paper will explore animated film advertisements in Britain during the 1930s. Growing academic attention has been given to non-theatrical film including the advertising film. Films That Sell: Moving Pictures and Advertising was published in 2016, providing the first significant overview of the topic exploring its history, theory and practice. However, such interest has tended to focus on the United States while the British context has received only limited but valuable attention from scholars such as Jez Stewart and Simon Brown and from scholars examining the animators associated with the GPO. This paper will contribute to this growing body of work by mapping key agents in the production of animated advertising films during the 1930s including animators such as Anson Dyer, producers such as Revelations Films, Ltd as well as advertising agents, film distributors and exhibitors in order to identify key industry structures and their influence on the development of British animated advertising films. The paper will include a case study of the film See How They Won (1935) made for Boots the Chemists and animated by Ub Iwerks, former collaborator of Walt Disney, in order to explore the film’s place within the wider advertising industry and the cultural context of the period.
This paper will explore the use of animation in display in Britain during the 1930s as part of a ... more This paper will explore the use of animation in display in Britain during the 1930s as part of a “commercial aesthetic” intended to sell and promote consumer culture. In the 1930s animation could be found most obviously in the cinema where Disney’s Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphony series had become hugely successful. It was also an increasingly popular technique for advertising and instructional films such as the promotional film See How They Won (1935) for Boots chemists. However animated motion was also exploited in other commercial contexts from animated sales aids such as mechanised mannequins found in retail stores, moving displays found in expositions and trade fairs to animated street signs like those found at Piccadilly Circus: ‘The rocket explodes in Piccadilly, the electric wheel spins round…unconsciously we move towards a shop and buy that which we have been so magnificently, with such blazing assurance, encouraged to buy.’ This paper will examine how animated motion was used to sell in the advertising film, in the department store and in electric signs through the creation of desire, novelty and attraction.
This paper will explore the BBC’s attempts to adapt animated film to radio in Britain during the ... more This paper will explore the BBC’s attempts to adapt animated film to radio in Britain during the 1930s and 1940s. During this period the corporation produced several programmes based on the music and characters of animated films as well as adaptations of feature films such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Moreover, they also came to experiment with the intriguing concept of “radio cartoons” which were inspired by the style and content of animated films but were originated for the radio.
In this paper I will outline and explore the BBC’s experiments into the “radio cartoon” in order consider how and why the animated film, seemingly so grounded in visual media, was translated to radio. I will use this point of media convergence to examine how the medium specificity of animation was being formulated and discussed in this period by the BBC and within critical discourse in Britain. Finally I will consider what influence the development of the “radio cartoon” had on British animation?
This paper will draw heavily on a wealth of primary research material from the written archives of the BBC, the trade press, national and local newspapers and magazines such as the BBC’s The Listener.
In this paper I intend to consider Maude Adams as an example of the intermedial influences on col... more In this paper I intend to consider Maude Adams as an example of the intermedial influences on colour in cinema in the early decades of the twentieth century and in particular the 1920s. Adams’s work provides an example of how technological and aesthetic developments in the theatre influenced work on colour in cinema, from the sharing of colour theories and technology to the participation of individuals from the theatre world in colour film production. In the second part of my paper I will consider why Adams became interested in lighting and colour cinema despite her limited technical knowledge. I will argue that Maude’s specialism can be linked to contemporary discourses relating to women and colour.
"This paper will consider the interrelationship of colour, fashion and Technicolor in the 1920s t... more "This paper will consider the interrelationship of colour, fashion and Technicolor in the 1920s through an examination of the intermedial context of colour standardisation and categorisation. The 1920s was a period in which colour was highly 'in vogue'. In the art, advertising, architecture, design and cinema of the jazz age, cultural fascination with colour was lively. Colour was also a subject of intense international debates concerning its artistic, scientific, philosophical and educational significance. Moreover, with the development of new and more accessible dyes, colour was more freely available to be exploited and experimented with. As in the case of cinema where colour was used in a variety of ways. Stencil, tinting and toning, which had been developed for film colouring in the early 1900s, were still frequently used technologies, as were new systems such as Prizma, Technicolor and others.
It was also a decade that saw increased activity around colour standardization and categorisation and moreover efforts to produce a universal colour nomenclature. Colour systems such as the Munsell system were promoted as meanings of measuring and standardising colour. In addition agencies such as America’s National Bureau of Standards were experimenting with the measurement of colour for a range of potential uses (Johnston, 2001). The language used to describe colour was also the focus of research by contemporaries culminating in 1930 in the publication of a Dictionary of Colour. Its purpose was to record all colour names in use up to that time and to provide ‘a record of color words and the particular sensations they identify’ (Maerz and Paul 1930). This desire to control the language of colour provides an interesting antithesis to the main function of colour in fashion. ‘Fashion thrives on novelty and change’ (Arnold, 2009) and colours are one means by which fashion can reinvent itself with each new season. This tension of colour in fashion is present in the world of textile and retail industry. For example, the Textile Color Card Association in America promoted the standardization of colours across the fashion industries as well as predicting and naming colours for the following season for the textile and retail industry (Blaszczyk, 2012). Thus proving there was a desire for both standardisation and variety in the growing consumer culture, resulting in colours becoming commodities.
These intermedial conditions provide an important context to the development and use of colour in film during the decade and in particular the close interrelationship between colour, fashion and film. In order to explore these themes we will limit ourselves to two colours that were 'hot' in the spring of 1926 but were also linked to color films: Alice Blue from Irene (Green, 1926) and Phantom Red from Phantom of the Opera (1925). Both functioned within a remarkable intermedial network, not only were they famous for the use of a Technicolor II inserts but also for their connection to glamorous women. These stars functioned as examples for young girls that were searching for their identity in this ‘jazz age’ or 'années folles'. The paper will explore the history of both colours, their origins and changing meanings, through their interaction with the film they were featured in and the wider world of fashion and beyond. In this way, we hope to provide a better understanding of the meaning and function of colour in connection to cinema and fashion and of the friction between the wish to control and the need to vary in capitalistic consumer culture.
"
This paper will explore female invention and the cinema between 1898 and 1945, focussing particul... more This paper will explore female invention and the cinema between 1898 and 1945, focussing particularly on technological innovation. I intend to examine the relationship female invertors had with film, the context for their research, the opportunities, problems and solutions they identified and explored rather than focussing simply on those inventions which had a significant impact on the development of cinema. Unfortunately, as is so often the case for women, the presence of female inventors in historical accounts and the surviving archive record is scarce, fragmented and often dismissive. As a result the innovative contribution of women remains relatively unexplored. My research seeks to correct this omission by identifying female inventors and exploring their work in greater detail. In this paper I will outline some of my initial findings and reflect on the difficulties and potentials of the fragmentary history of female invention that is revealed by the surviving archive record. I want to focus particularly on the potentials of the growing digital archive to explore anonymous, forgotten participants of the history of cinema such as these innovative women.
Through a preliminary examination of digitised patent records, trade journals and other sources I have identified 27 female inventors working in and around the cinema demonstrating a small but notable number of women were engaging with technical research in the field.
This thesis is a study of the regional exhibition of Kinemacolor in the UK and USA between 1909 a... more This thesis is a study of the regional exhibition of Kinemacolor in the UK and USA between 1909 and 1916. It considers the extent and role of Kinemacolor in the UK exhibition market. It also introduces the process’s experience in the USA in contrast to that in the UK. In addition it considers more widely the extent of colours films in the UK market and the impact of Kinemacolor on demand for other indexical and non-indexical colour films. The thesis is divided into nine chapters, plus an introduction, conclusion, appendixes and bibliography. Chapter One provides an introduction to the types of colour film in the UK exhibition market and considers the extent of Kinemacolor and other colour films more generally. Chapter Two examines the early distribution and exhibition of Kinemacolor through the Provincial Palaces Limited circuit and the successes and limitations of this arrangement. Chapter Three assesses the distribution of Kinemacolor after Provincial Palaces Limited directly through the Natural Color Kinematograph Limited. Chapter Four considers the changing types of venues to screened Kinemacolor and why these venues were attracted to it. Chapter Five considers promotional material produced by the Natural Color Kinematograph Company Limited to consider exhibitors relationship with the process. Chapter Six looks at a number of case studies as examples of Kinemacolor in the regions. Chapter Seven look at the influence of Kinemacolor on other colour processes and proposes demand for Kinemacolor not only reflected more general interest in other colour systems but also stimulated it. Chapters Eight and Nine conclude the work by examining and comparing the distribution, exhibition and promotion of Kinemacolor in the USA. The thesis reveals the significance of the exhibition of Kinemacolor across the UK, examines the influence of distribution and exhibition issues and the impact Kinemacolor had more widely on colour and the exhibition market.