Having graduated and subsequently become a teacher at the École nationale supérieure des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, Sébastien Laudenbach explores animation through sand, papercut, sculpture, and drawing. His experiments within the Ouvroir d’Animation Potentielle (OuLiPo) led him to the cryptokinographic method (literally ‘hidden writing in movement’), a process aiming to represent the figure on screen through movement, where a single frame alone cannot fully convey it.

His free, spaced, flickering, colorful animation, liberated from storyboards, often improvised frame by frame, bursts with forms and colors, making them malleable. This approach defines his feature film, The Girl Without Hands, drawn alone over nine months, earning him the Jury Prize at the Annecy Festival in 2016.

Additionally, he co-directed Chicken for Linda! with Chiara Malta, which was awarded the Crystal at the Annecy Festival in 2023 and the César for Best Animated Film in 2024.

• Exposition Matières à animer, 20 April—17 July 2023