Surrealist Sources of Eastern European Animation Film

This article investigates the relationship between surrealism and animation film, attempting to establish the characteristic features of surrealist animation film and to determine an approach for identifying them. Drawing on the interviews conducted during the research, I will also strive to chart the terrain of contemporary surrealist animation film and its authors, most of who work in Eastern Europe. My principal aim is to establish why surrealism enjoyed such relevance and vitality in post-World War II Eastern Europe. I will conclude that the popularity of surrealist animation film in Eastern Europe can be seen as a continuation of a tradition (Prague was an important centre of surrealism during the interwar period), as well as an act of protest against the socialist realist paradigm of the Soviet period.