Chen Lei, an associate professor from the Department of Information Art & Design in the Academy of Arts & Design at Tsinghua University, won the Jury's Choice Award in the Special Interest Group for Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques (SIGGRAPH) 2022 Electronic Theater. He won the award for his 3D animation entitled "The End of War", earlier this month.

The Electronic Theater is a famous computer animation festival which is certified by the Oscars. During past decades, international animation giants such as Walt Disney, Pixar Animation Studios and DreamWorks Animation have always been active participants in the annual SIGGRAPH Electronic Theater.

Another two awards in the annual SIGGRAPH Electronic Theater are "Best in Show" and "Best Student Project".

As the first Chinese winner of an award in the annual SIGGRAPH Electronic Theater, Chen has spent about a year improving his artistic styles in the production of his short film, which lasts six and a half minutes.

To present a fresh visual animation language and incorporate sculptural elements into the award-winning animation, Chen drew inspiration from the masterpieces of internationally renowned sculptors such as Auguste Rodin, Emile Antoine Bourdelle, and Medardo Rosso, until he developed his own artistic style and adopted stop-motion techniques to create several hundreds of digital animation models.

He has heavily relied on symbolic expressions instead of language to convey the common aspiration of mankind for peace in his anti-war animations. The inspiration came from the art and life stories of female German artist Kathe Kollwitz.

Chen attended the SIGGRAPH 2022 Conference and the Electronic Theater, which were held in Vancouver, Canada, from Aug 8 to 11, via video link because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

When talking about his artistic creation, Chen noted that all faculty members and students in the Academy of Arts & Design have attached great importance to the principle of originality, a natural strength of the academy in its creative thinking, and added that the artistic deposit in the academy is crucial to helping him win the award.

Other contributors to the award-winning animation included Kang Ying, Dai Dai, Lao Xiaoqing and Mo Junhong from the Department of Information Art & Design in the Academy of Arts & Design. It also received assistance from Jing Liang from Hubei Institute of Fine Arts, Mi Wenbo from the China Broadcasting Performing-Arts Troupe and Chen Dagang, a famous domestic artist in the field of computer graphics.

Editor: Li Han