Thursday January 8 * 7pm * $10-20 * TICKETS
We are pleased to present an evening of films by Jim Doran, who will be present for a discussion with the audience following the screening.
Jim Doran is a Baltimore artist, musician and filmmaker. He earned a BA in music composition at Washington College, and an MFA in studio art at Towson University. His work has been exhibited/screened in the United States, Europe, and in the American Visionary Art Museum.
Works for Screening
A Job as the Moon. 3:54
Based on a dream I had where I got a job being the moon. Made in 2020.Sound experiment no. 5. 2:37
Bass guitar through various guitar effects, with iPhone footage taken during the summer of 2020.Scientifically Sound Questions. 2:00
Hand drawn/cut paper animation on paper scroll. Made in 2020.Scientifically Sound Questions Covid Edition. 2:11
Hand drawn/cut paper animation on paper scroll. Made in 2020.The Benefits of Radiation. 2:55
Hand drawn frame by frame animation. Made in 2020.Higher Ed. 1:52
Made with discarded copies of 1960’s College & University Business Journal. All sound was recorded in an academic library. Made in 2020.Indigo. 4:11
A commission for the Sweaty Eyeballs Animation Festival, where musicians were paired with animators. I made this cut paper scroll animation for WUME’s Indigo. Made in 2020.Sound experiment no. 10.
Hand drawn animation, pocket iPhone video and guitar. Made in 2021.Brood X. 1:37
Made for an outdoor screening in Denver, Brood X is a cut paper animation that commemorates the cicada invasion of the summer of 2021.Pasticland. 3:47
Using discarded junk accumulated on neighborhood walks during the pandemic, Plasticland is a stream of consciousness stop motion animation filmed in my backyard over 4 seasons in 2021.Sound experiment no. 13. 1:37
Prepared guitar, bread ties. Made in 2021.Sound experiment no. 15. 2:17
Hand drawn animation over the recording Engagement, commemorating my engagement to my wife. Made in 2021.Sound experiment no. 16.
A photo of Edward Gorey’s oven (taken in his house) set to guitar. Made in 2022.The Art of War. 2:53
Using decommissioned government archive Navy prints from an academic library, and issues of Life Magazine, The Art of War features animated drawings. Completed in 2023.The Lunatics. 3:01
Cut paper puppets animated with a homemade multiplane camera stand. While searching for “animals of alien origin” in deep space, a crew of astronauts discover it's all fun and games until someone breaks the gravity generator.Lunacy. 1:04
Made for projection at the Peale Museum in Baltimore, Lunacy is set in The Lunatics universe. It was designed to fill three windows/panels on the second floor of the museum, facing Holliday street.Brains, a postmodern prometheus story. 5:19
Brains is a Prometheus tale warning us not to lose our heads over AI. This was an experiment to see if I could make use of generative AI while still presenting "the hand of the artist" in an unambiguous way. I spent weeks generating thousands of images to arrive at 125 usable backgrounds. I used generative AI to:-produce specific backgrounds based on my text descriptions.
-enlarge these images to be suitable for film - the default output of most generators is 1024 x 1024 pixels, and I used AI to increase selected images to 8000px X 8000px.
-create a JavaScript function to accept an HTML input and return gibberish text in a terminal screen setting - I coded the html and css myself, and recorded the working script for the animation.
I wrote the story, made the characters and hand drew all the animation. I also recorded the foley, sound effects and produced the audio in my studio. This film has screened at seventeen festivals so far in the United States, Europe, the Caribbean, and in Canada. It won Best Indie Animation at the Portugal Independent Film Festival.
Made in 2023.Sound experiment no. 24. :30
Drums recorded in the cymbal testing room at the Memphis Drum Shop with my iPhone, and a photo of Elvis Presley’s oven surreptitiously taken at Graceland. Made in 2024.Sound experiment no. 26. 4:53
Audio recorded in my basement set to video taken in Arbutus, Maryland. Made in 2024.Sound experiment no. 28. 1:11
Music recorded in my basement with hand drawn animation over iPhone video. Made in 2024Sound experiment no. 30. 2:09
Music recorded in my basement with public domain video from the Internet Archive. Made in 2024.Electric Cowhead
Music video for a song recorded at home, with leftover AI images from the Brains experiment. Made in 2024.Magus Incognito. :77
"The lips of wisdom are closed, except to the ears of Understanding"
-The Kybalion
The Kybalion, a book about ancient Hermetic philosophy, was published in 1908. The original author(s) were listed as "The Three Initiates," and there is a compelling theory that William Walker Atkinson is the real author. Atkinson sometimes published under the pseudonym Magus Incognito. This 77 second hand drawn animation is inspired by The Kybalion and its author.ESP and Other Games. 5:25
A recording of a performance at the 2024 Sweaty Eyeballs Animation Adjacent Festival, which accompanied screenings of Magus Incognito.Terms of Service. 8:39
After the fall of the Francis Scott Key bridge, I immediately began to struggle with my commute. I began to think about cause and effect, and how this incident might playout in someone's life. I wrote, directed and animated Terms of Service. I did the sound and music myself. I also coded actual webpages for The Baltimore Breaker and The Rest Nest App seen in the animation. Terms of Service won the Baltimore jury award for best animation at the 2025 Sweaty Eyeballs Animation Festival.
