Bruce Charles Bickford (February 11, 1947 – April 28, 2019) was an American artist, animator, and filmmaker, who worked primarily in line and

clay animation Clay animation or claymation, sometimes plasticine animation, is one of many forms of stop-motion animation. Each animated piece, either character or background, is "deformable"—made of a malleable substance, usually plasticine clay. Tra ...

. From 1974 to 1980, he collaborated with

Frank Zappa Frank Vincent Zappa (December 21, 1940 – December 4, 1993) was an American musician, composer, and bandleader. His work is characterized by wikt:nonconformity, nonconformity, Free improvisation, free-form improvisation, sound experimen ...

in Los Angeles. Bickford's animation was featured extensively in the Frank Zappa videos ''

Baby Snakes ''Baby Snakes'' is a film which includes footage from Frank Zappa's 1977 Halloween concert at New York City's Palladium Theater, backstage antics from the crew, and stop motion clay animation from award-winning animator Bruce Bickford. Relea ...

'' and ''

The Dub Room Special ''The Dub Room Special'' is a film produced by Frank Zappa for direct-to-video release in October, 1982. The video combines footage from a performance at KCET, the KCET studios in Los Angeles on August 27, 1974, a concert performed at Palladium (N ...

''. Zappa also released a video titled ''

The Amazing Mr. Bickford ''The Amazing Mr. Bickford'' is a video released by Frank Zappa in 1987, containing orchestral pieces by Zappa set to the clay animation of Bruce Bickford. It was released direct-to-video. To date it has not yet been released on DVD. Music * N ...

'', which was entirely composed of Bickford animations set to a soundtrack of Zappa's orchestral music.

Biography

Bickford was born in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

in 1947, one of four sons to George Edward Bickford and Audrey Ione Bickford (nee Spencer). He served with the

U.S. Marines The United States Marine Corps (USMC), also referred to as the United States Marines, is the Marines, maritime land force military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for conducting expeditionary warfare, exped ...

and fought during the

Vietnam War The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...

. Bickford's animations depict surreal scenes based on his unique worldview. Often outwardly seeming to be somewhat disconnected from the world around him, Bruce Bickford's work is extremely subjective in its content and concepts, making for some disturbing and shocking imagery. Much of his video work depicted fast-moving, fluid-like transformations of human figures and disfigured faces into odd beasts on surreal structural settings with impressive camera effects (moving around within his stop-motion animation). His life and work were featured in the 2004 biographical documentary film ''Monster Road'', directed by Brett Ingram. In 2006, he was working on ''Boar's Head/Whore's Bed'' (line animation, 4,500+ frames and counting), ''Tales of the Green River'' and ''Castle 2001'', a

feature-length A feature film or feature-length film is a narrative film (motion picture or "movie") with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole presentation in a commercial entertainment program. The term ''feature film'' originall ...

film which is animated using 3D shapes made out of bits of paper. In 2008, ''Prometheus' Garden'' was released, a 28-minute short originally completed in 1988. The

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kin ...

also features ''Luck of a Foghorn'', a documentary about the making of the film. Bickford was the first guest to appear on the internet radio show Pussyfoot. In 2010, he made rare appearances in several European cities following an invitation of the Brussels' Offscreen Film Festival and Nova Cinema. In 2015, Bickford was working on a 500-plus-page

graphic novel A graphic novel is a long-form, fictional work of sequential art. The term ''graphic novel'' is often applied broadly, including fiction, non-fiction, and anthologized work, though this practice is highly contested by comic scholars and industry ...

titled ''Vampire Picnic''. It was stated at the time he was hoping to publish it with

Fantagraphics Fantagraphics (previously Fantagraphics Books) is an American publisher of alternative comics, classic comic strip anthologies, manga, magazines, graphic novels, and the erotic Eros Comix imprint. History Founding Fantagraphics was found ...

. On September 1, 2015, Bickford's new animated feature ''Cas'l'' was released on DVD. Most of the original animating had been done from 1988 to 1997. The film (or earlier versions of it) had previously been shown at various film festivals from 2008 onwards with live musical accompaniment, as a final soundtrack was not yet made.Feats of Clay: Bruce Bickford
. 2010-05-27. Bickford died on April 28, 2019 from cardiac arrest. He was 72 years old.

Filmography

*1964/65 – Animated model cars and crude clay figures on 8mm film. 10 minutes. *1969 – Tree clay animation. 2.5 minutes. *1970 – Clay battle scene with more detailed figures. 2.5 minutes. *1971 – Last Battle on Flat Earth clay animation. 4 minutes. *1972 – Castle stuff and bar room scene. clay animation. 15 minutes. *1973 – Start of the Quest clay animation short. 3 minutes. *1974 – Little Boy in School ( featuring Gus Reeves as a child) clay animation short. 4 minutes. *1974 – A Token of His Extreme (Frank Zappa) *1979 –

(Frank Zappa) *1982 –

(Frank Zappa) *1987 –

Video From Hell ''Video from Hell'' is a video released in 1987 by Frank Zappa. It is a compilation of pieces of music and video from a series of projects that Zappa presumably planned to finish and release for home video, including a companion video for the '' ...

and

(Frank Zappa) *1988 – Prometheus' Garden. 27 minutes. *2004 – Monster Road *2008 – Prometheus' Garden DVD *2015 – Cas'l

References

External links

Bruce Bickford's Official Website
*
Website of the Monster Road documentary
{{DEFAULTSORT:Bickford, Bruce 1947 births 2019 deaths Animators from Washington (state) American surrealist artists Surrealist filmmakers United States Marine Corps personnel of the Vietnam War Artists from Seattle Clay animators Stop motion animators Frank Zappa