EXPOTOONS 2008

At the Festival’s launching press conference, at Borges Cultural Center, president of the Argentinean INCAA Liliana Mazure shared: “The National Institute of Film and Audiovisual Arts is proud to accompany and support ExpoToons, a necessary space for promoting the animation film industry and art. We take as ours the Festival’s objective, which is to promote animation as an engine of growth for the audiovisual and cultural industry".

EXPOTOONS 2008 has been a huge success, thanks to the support of the entire national and international animation community, who can appreciate the great potential of Argentina and Latin America. The event was full of conferences, professionals, entities, universities and sponsors, and a great amount of public showing with their support the importance of opening a space for animation..

There were 3.500 accredited for screenings, conferences and animation market..

There were 40 PARTICIPATING COUNTRIES showing their work, U.S.A, France, Canada, Germany, Spain, Brazil, Chile, Belgium, U.K., Mexico, Korea, Greece, China, Australia, Argentina, Italy, Turkey, among others..

AWARDS CEREMONY
16 CONFERENCIAS

PIXAR. Juan Buhler

At full audience, Juan Buhler spoke about his experience at Pixar Animation Studios. He detailed his work on feature films such as Ratatouille and Wall-E.

JURY 2008

Prestigious national and international juries honored our Festival with their presence. Some of the awarded films in ExpoToons 2008 Official Selection were:
'Wood & Stock: Sex, oregano and rock n roll' , of Otto Guerra (Brazil), got the best prize award for a Full-length film. 'El empleo' (The employment) of Santiago 'Bou' Grasso, an Argentinean production, was gold awarded in Short film category.
For TV Series, the award went to 'Papawa', a France-Spain coproduction.
Two creators from JWT and Gizmo were gold awarded for Best Advertising.
And the Graduation Film award went to “Hugh”, a production from ESMA, the famous French Art School..


ENTREGA DE premios
Liliana Mazure and Rossana Manfredi.

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Tiziana Loschi at Expotoons Awards Ceremony.

As closure for the Festival, and commemorating International Animation day, there was the Awarding Ceremony Gala, attended by several personalities and representatives of Belgium USA, Spain, Mexico and France Embassies. Conducting the Ceremony was journalist Julio Lagos.
There were special Mentions for the Full-length Film category, to “Sita Sings The Blues”, of Nina Paley (USA), “The Legend of Nahualá”, of Soco Aguilar (Mexico) and 'Idiots & Angels', of notorious Bill Plympton (USA). For Short Film Category, mentions went to 'My Happy End' of Milen Vitanov (Germany) and 'Orgesticulanismus' of Mathieu Labaye (Belgium).
U$S 10.000 were handed out in prizes.

ANIMATION BUSINESS MARKET

ExpoToons 2008 hosted the '1st Animation International Business Market', co-organized by Buenos Aires City Commerce Agency, Exportar Foundation and ExpoToons. There were 160 meetings, with excellent results, as they allowed initiating very important business relationships, among the participating countries. One of the Festival’s main objectives in this area was achieved: not only to present the creativity and capability of companies and producers showing their work, but also to place them in a central position regarding the global animation market, giving them the chance to show their work to world-known buyers. As a result, it can be said that every buyer has found in this event a starting point for further negotiations with the participating international companies. These were some of them:
Imira Entertainment, Nickelodeon, Antena TV, Ubisoft and Animex.

EXHIBITION FAIR

ExpoToons 2008 had an exclusive area for institutional Stands, where the participating companies showed their creativity, displaying highly appealing interactive designs and attracting a great audience. Several entities exhibited at the Fair, including government agencies, educational institutes, and the most relevant studios and companies.
From this place we broadcasted live the conferences on LCD screens strategically located for the public not to miss any activity going on at the different areas of the Festival, since the conference rooms exceeded their capacity due to the high interest generated..

1. A great amount of attendants enjoyed the Expotoons stands.
2. Damián De Santo with his famiy at Expotoons 2008.