什么是动画

What is Cartoon?

动画在电影诞生之前便已存在,与以纪实为基本美学特征的电影完全不同,动画的源头是漫画和叙事连环画。这两种绘画的形式一般来说不被作为美术造型的学科所认同,因为漫画强调的是讽刺和幽默,即一种图示的意指性;叙事连环画强调的则是故事在时间上的因果呈递,与空间艺术无涉。动画混合了漫画的意指和连环画的叙事,成为了一种意指的叙事。由于意指和叙事都不是一般美术所具有的特性,因此动画本体与美术也拉开了距离。动画只有在脱离叙事的情况下才有可能向美术靠拢,在脱离意指的情况下则向一般故事电影靠拢,同时脱离意指和叙事的情况下混同于先锋艺术,这便是动画的边界,它们分别隶属于艺术动画、仿真动画和先锋动画这些不同的动画类型。由于连环画的历史可以追溯到东西方早期宗教的故事画,它的功能和特点都是为了宗教教育服务的,因此动画也就自然地具有了教育的特性,动画本体所具有的这一特点可以从认知哲学和符号学得到支持和验证。

Different from film with its particular aesthetic feature of recording the real life, cartoon derived from caricature and narrative serial pictures. Generally speaking, such two kinds of painting are not considered to belong to plas- tic arts. As a picture full of significance, caricature tends to satirize and tease. And narrative serial pictures pay attention to conveying a story in sequence, so, it quite differs from spatial art. Cartoon mixes the significance of carica- ture and narration of serial pictures ; therefore it is a form of connotative narration. With this feature, cartoon differs a lot from fine arts. It could only get close to fine arts when it takes off narration, and could get close to film when it takes off significance and to avant - garde art when it takes off both narration and significance.