In June Animation Ireland attended the Animation Festival and MIFA with a delegation of member studios and partners.
Over the course of its 60 years, the Annecy Festival has established itself as a global event dedicated to animation, bringing together the most esteemed professionals from the sector to celebrate animation’s creative and diverse styles and techniques.
MIFA is the professional and most famous event for the animation industry. It is for this reason that it is not open to the public but only to the accredited person. It covers an area of 7,231 m2, in the congress centre rooms and around the Imperial Palace, including 5,300 m2 of marquees and relaxation area to accommodate more than 660 international exhibitors.
The market allows recruiters, candidates, producers, distributors, sellers, TV channels and software creators to meet during 4 days dedicated to animation. Conferences and a radio showcase also take place during this period.
Following the success of our small stand in 2022, and consultation with our member studios and stakeholders, we decided to avail of a bigger area at the market in 2023. We were delighted to partner with Enterprise Ireland, Northern Ireland Screen, RTE, Screen Ireland, and The National Talent Academy for Animation, as well as a roster of Animation Ireland’s Member Studios to represent Ireland at MIFA this year.
The Team
Participation in the festival and Market can be quite intense, setting up the stand and then insuring continuous presence for the flow of visitors. It was also important to insure that all present would have time to leave the stand for meetings, attending relevant talks and screenings or simply to take breaks. We were thankful to have a team of representatives on the stand throughout the week:
- Alanna Clarke – Market Advisor – Enterprise Ireland
- Andrew Byrne – Head of Television – Screen Ireland
- Deirdre Barry – Programme Director – National Talent Academy for Animation
- Delphine Coudray – Head of Operations – Animation Ireland
- Joseph Orr – Courses Coordinator – National Talent Academy for Animation
- Louise Ryan. Head of Marketing & Communications – Screen Ireland
- Róisín Chapman – Administrative Assistant – Animation Ireland
- Ronan McCabe – CEO – Animation Ireland
In total, 180 delegates from Ireland were in attendance at the festival.
On the first morning of MIFA, we hosted a welcoming and networking breakfast on the stand, organised with our partners and Animation UK.
This event was a great success, with many from Ireland and from the international Animation community turning up to catch up and create new contacts. These were the first steps in a full week of follow-up meetings on the stand. (Between 14 and 28 meetings per day took place on the stand!)
The Irish companies who travelled to Annecy were:
