THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Animation Masters Summit, the prestigious annual event organised by Toonz Media Group will be held on Friday and Saturday at Technopark. The summit will honour the pioneer of Indian animation Bhimsain Khurana with the ‘Legend of Animation’ title.
The acclaimed producer and director has 16 national and 7 international awards to his credit, apart from bagging many prestigious popular awards. He was also awarded the Jurors Award at National Film Festival 2002 for his film Orchestra and Lifetime Achievement Awards by FICCI-Frames (2005) and Arena Animation Academy (2003).
The ‘Legend of Animation’ honour is being bestowed upon Bhimsain Khurana for his all-round contribution towards entertainment industry, said P Jayakumar, CEO, Toonz Media Group.
Dignitaries who will be attending the summit this year include Lauren Glaubach - YouTube Kids USA, Amy Blair - YouTube Kids USA, Anjum Rajabali - Bollywood Screenwriter, Ronojoy Chakraborty - Sony YAY!, Shrikumar Menon - founder CMD and creative head of PUSH Integrated Communications, director of ‘Mahabharat’ the Rs 1,000 crore budget movie, John McKenna - One Animation, Dong-Su Jung, ICONIX, Korea.
Toonz conducted the first summit way back in 1999 and today the Masters Summit is one of the top international events for legendary stalwarts including top Hollywood directors, masters from the media and entertainment industry across the globe to get together and share their invaluable treasure of knowledge with the young and aspiring artists and enthusiasts.
The ceremony will be attended by high profile dignitaries from world over and will be inaugurated by the industry veteran Fred Wang, honorary vice president of the China Film Foundation, director of the board of the Hong Kong International Film Festival Society Limited, committee member of the Hong Kong-France Business Partnership and chairman of Salon Films Group.
“Organising Animation Masters Summit (AMS) is one of its humble way of giving back to the society. Through this sublime event, we provide a platform for amateurs to interact and learn from the legends of the industry.
We have been organising AMS for so many years that now it is a fixed item in every industry personnel’s calendar. Everyone who is passionate about media in general and animation in particular are welcome to the summit,” said Jayakumar.
In conjunction with the Summit, Toonz is also organising the Flying Elephant Competition, an international short film contest for students and professionals.
The two-day summit will conclude with the Flying Elephant award ceremony. Dr Avaneesh, head of development Toonz Media Group will be curating the summit and Anoop Vince, business analyst at Toonz, will be the festival coordinator.