Oliver Harrison


Oliver Harrison is a filmmaker, artist and animator based in London. His films have been shown around the world in festivals including: Cannes Film Festival, New York Film Festival, San Francisco Film Festival and the London Film Festival and have picked up many awards. His work has been featured at Tate Modern, the Whitechapel Gallery, The Barbican Centre and the Institute of Contemporary Arts. A pioneer of kinetic typography and hugely influential in the development of motion graphics, much of Harrison's work has a strong typographic element. His feature film The Fallen Word premiered at the BFI Southbank in 2013.

Film career

Harrison was recently commissioned by the London Sinfonietta along with three other animators: Edwin Roston, Karoline Glusiec and Petra Freeman, to animate the opera Into The Little Hill written by George Benjamin with libretto by Martin Crimp. The piece was produced through Animate Projects.
His debut feature film The Fallen Word premiered at The BFI Southbank in May 2013 coinciding with the release of the DVD The Fallen Word and Collected Films, funded by Arts Council England. Written and directed by Harrison, The Fallen Word stars: Julian Bleach, Steve Smith, Will Strange, Jim Conway, Emma Hill, Dominic Cazenove and Gavin Molly and has been described as: 'a sinister fairytale'. The Fallen Word was invited to screen at the Beginning festival in St Petersburg in 2014.
Apocalypse Rhyme won the award for Best Motion Graphics in the British Animation Awards 2014. The film was commissioned by Channel 4's Random Acts and produced by Animate Projects and Lupus Films. The film made official selection in the Aesthetica Short Film Festival, The Imperial War Museum Film Festival and also in the Writ Large festival in Santa Cruz where it was projected against buildings. Apocalypse Rhyme was featured in articles in Artribune, and Savage; Lucy Felbusch described the film as 'devastating and beautiful' and is listed as number 12 in the Creative Bloc 'must see examples of kinetic typography'.
Love is All, a three-minute short, was filmed in 35mm, on a 1917 Bell and Howell camera, using multiple exposures. The film was shown in over 70 festivals around the world and was selected for the Cannes Film Festival Director's Fortnight in 2000. Love is All picked up seven awards around the world including the Jury prize at New York Film Festival and the Jury prize at the Oberhausen Film Festival. The film went on general release in cinemas with various films in 2000; Time Out described Love is All as "an ineffable sweet ode d’amour". The film was screened at Tate Modern London has part of Thresholds of the Frame and was featured in the Barbican Centre exhibition: Passionate Obsessions.
Spirit of Place was the first film to be shot entirely on a motion control camera. In 2015 Spirit of Place featured in the Institute of Contemporary Arts' exhibition: Poetry FIlm Parallax curated by Zata Banks. In 2016 the exhibition was invited by the Bauhaus Film-Institut to play at the Backup Film Festival in Weimar.
Oliver Harrison studied at St Martins School of Art. His graduation film Amore Baciami received great critical acclaim. The first film to exclusively feature animated typography, Amore Baciami was nominated for Best Animated Film and Best Student Film in the 1988 British Animation Awards. Amore Baciami's TV debut was on Thames TV's First Run introduced by David Puttnam. He said of the film: 'I think it's quite brilliant'. The film was shown around the world, including festivals in Hong Kong Film Festival and the famous Spike and Mike's Festival of Animation in L.A. Excerpts of the film were also shown on MTV in the USA. Harrison said of the film:
Amore Baciami was bought by DMB&B, an excerpt was used as a commercial called Letters of Love for The Royal Mail for Valentine's Day 1989. This cut down version of the film went on to win a Gold Lion at Cannes, a Gold Arrow at the British Advertising awards, a D&AD Pencil and the Epica d'Or. Oliver was commissioned in 1992 to shoot the titles for Merchant Ivory's Oscar winning film: Howards End. Following this success, Harrison signed up with Acme Filmworks in Hollywood to make commercials. Harrison created spots for Nike, Marie Claire, P&O Ferries, The Independent newspaper, Molson Beer, Toyota, IBD and MTV amongst others. Harrison's Toyota Rav 4 commercial was Spot of the Week in Shoot magazine in 1996.

Early music career

Harrison played drums with the punk band Satan's Rats from Evesham and at the age of 17 signed a record contract with DJM Records. The band released 3 singles, their third, the celebrated You make me Sick was produced by Dr Feelgood producer Vic Maile. The Rats played in The Roxy London and various clubs across the country including Barbarella's in Birmingham. On 18 December 1977 they supported The Sex Pistols at their second gig at the Wolverhampton Lafayette Club as part of the infamous Spots tour. The Rats also played a one off gig in HM Prison Long Lartin, where the band met John McVicar who was helping with the equipment.
In 1979 The band changed its name to The Photos and were joined by singer Wendy Wu. At the end of a bidding war the band ended up signing to CBS in 1980. It was the biggest record deal for an unknown band at that time. The Photos spent much of the time gigging, playing in the early days with: The Adverts, The Cure, John Cooper Clarke and The Fall and later toured the UK supporting The Undertones and Squeeze. Once, at The Marquee in Wardour Street, they were supported by an unknown up and coming Irish group called U2. Later Jools Holland and the Millionaires supported The Photos on another UK tour.
When The Photos played Manchester Polytechnic were reviewed by Morrissey in the Record Mirror, writing under his full name Steven Morrissey. The review was also featured in the book Morrissey and Marr the Severed Alliance. He said of Oliver:
At the height of their powers The Photos went on a stadium tour supporting The Police in Europe. The band made a number of TV appearances including Top Pop in Holland 1980 and The Old Grey Whistle Test in 1981. They headlined the Lyceum in London supported by the Thompson Twins in 1981.U2 were 3rd on the bill. Their highest single entry was Irene which reached 56 in the charts. The eponymously named 1st album got to number 4, although it was surrounded by controversy that the record company had hyped it.
The Photos recorded a second album with Tony Visconti in his Good Earth Studios in Soho London. The album was not released until 2012 by Cherry Red Records. The band split from Wendy in 1982, securing another record deal as a three piece with Rialto Records. The new line up released a couple of ill-fated singles. Disillusioned with the music industry Oliver left in 1982 to pursue a career in art.

Filmography

Short films