Fourth Annual Richmond Animation Festival brings fringe animation to the general public

Dash Shaw wants you to watch weird animated movies. 

“There’s tons of awesome animated shorts coming out all the time that I think a bajillion people would like,” said Shaw, an animator and cartoonist who grew up in Richmond. “They’re rarely the ones getting Academy Award nominations. You have to go to the right festival and know.” 

Enter the Richmond Animation Festival. Shaw is one of three co-organizers of the festival, now in its fourth year. His main hope is that the festival makes unconventional, independent animated films, the kinds most non-animators wouldn’t even know existed, easier for Richmonders to access. 

“For our animation festival, if you’ve looked around at the audience, I think for a lot of people, this is new to them. We’re blowing their minds. And that’s the mission,” Shaw said. “A lot of people hadn’t seen anything close to some of the things we’ve screened in past years.”

Shaw knows that when most people think about animated movies, they think about movies made by large studios like Pixar. But to Shaw, there’s so much more out there. The Richmond Animation Festival gives all Richmonders—not just artists and students—a chance to see the innovative animation happening on the fringes. 

“I always think these things have a much bigger potential audience than they have,” he said. “I know firsthand the reality of these things is that the movies that penetrate the public consciousness are movies that have millions upon millions of promotional dollars behind them.”

To Shaw, the festival offers the kind of experimental, curated movie screenings usually only found in large cities like New York. But Shaw passionately believes that Richmond will love independent animation if they give it a chance.

“Richmond should be a really hopping place,” Shaw said. “It should have a really, really awesome arts scene. And I feel like this animation festival—it’s our contribution to the town.”

During the covid-19 pandemic, New York animators Jordan Bruner and Zack Williams moved to Richmond and first developed the idea for an event that brings experimental animation into the heart of the city. They brought Shaw in to help. In 2023, the three of them put on the first Richmond Animation Festival at the Byrd Theatre, where they screened Shaw’s own movie, Cryptozoo.

Now, Bruner and Williams choose the animated shorts each year, while Shaw is responsible for booking a new independent feature-length animated movie and special guest. Hundreds of people attend the festival each year, but Shaw wants the event to keep expanding. 

For the first time, this year’s animation festival will be held across two days: the animated shorts will screen at Studio Two Three on April 25, and the feature-length film, Boys Go to Jupiter by renowned filmmaker Julian Glander, will screen at the Byrd on April 26. The screening at the Byrd will be followed by a live Q&A with Glander himself, who will be in attendance. Both screenings begin at 7 p.m. 

Ben Cronly, executive director of The Byrd Theatre, believes the Richmond Animation Festival is an event unlike any other event the Byrd hosts throughout the year. “It’s one of the city’s most creative cinematic traditions,” he said. 

“There’s something really special about a 1920s theater,” Shaw said about screening Glander’s film at the Byrd. “If you’re going to see his movie anywhere on planet earth, seeing it at the Byrd with a bunch of people is the very best way to see it.” 

“I think a lot of people would like this movie,” he added. “It’s unusual in a very charming way.” 

Shaw wants to bring arts-minded folks around the city together in one place and for the event to feel approachable and communal. Attendees of the feature-length screening on April 26 will have a chance to interact with Glander directly. A Q&A with the audience will follow the screening, and anyone who attends is invited to an afterparty at New York Deli. 

“Ideally there is a social component to this, where you can meet like-minded people,” said Shaw. “I want that to be a thing.” 

Glander’s film had a long run at the Independent Film Channel Center in New York City, and has enjoyed the kind of substantial theatrical run that is uncommon for independent animation. 

“Getting normal people to buy a ticket on a Friday night to see your weird animated movie? That’s a special, rare thing,” Shaw said.

The shorts presentation at Studio Two Three will give ticket-buyers access to films Richmonders might not be able to find anywhere else. 

“These shorts are curated,” Shaw said. “Jordan and Zack have plucked out the best of the best. And a lot of them aren’t on YouTube.” 

Of course, Shaw’s work to bring independent animation to Richmond costs time and money. In addition to helping organize festival every year, Shaw, a parent, is also a graphic novelist and is currently working on his own upcoming film, Unknownia. 

Shaw earns nothing financially from the festival.  

“It’s a passion project,” Shaw said. “I’m sure it’s a money losing event at this point.” 

But this kind of sacrifice is par for the course for Shaw, who lives and breathes art, loves Richmond, and wants desperately for his hometown to see independent animation the same way he does. The fact that the festival has yet to turn a profit doesn’t much phase him. 

“I hope that we do this for years and years and years,” Shaw said. 

To Shaw, Bruner, and Williams, the movies, the artists, and the local community matter more than money. 

“I don’t participate in a lot of things that I probably should participate in to make my community better,” Shaw said. “But I do this.”