Nick Fox-Gieg / Short Films

This is a story about a little bird who claims to be able to predict the future. Don't trust him.

One afternoon in March of 2003, I came across a little cast-bronze bird statue in a museum. The label said that it was the Little Bird of Disaster, and it came from 17th-century Benin. Printed underneath was a myth associated with the Bird--and it struck me more as current satire than an old folk tale.

My animated adaptation was developed at The Kitchen's 2003 summer workshop. The speaking characters are real-time "video puppets," controlled with Mark Coniglio's Isadora software. The piece was actually performed, like they say, in front of a live studio audience (you can hear them in the background).