Clay artist sculpts path onto Aardman course
A LOCAL artist’s journey with clay is set to reach a whole new level next month when she starts a stop-motion course with legendary animation studio Aardman.
Donna Simpson, who is well known for creating ‘bobblehead’ figures, said she is feeling “utterly excited” by the opportunity to work with the studio famed for the likes of Wallace and Gromit and Shaun the Sheep.
The course, which will be held in Bristol, will begin in mid-November and run for five weeks.
“I’ve always really admired Aardman and I love all their animations, and I’ve really wanted to work with them in some aspect,” Simpson told Shetland News.
“The idea of doing a course with them is something I’ve wanted to do for a while.”
She said she “couldn’t believe it” when she got accepted onto the stop motion clay course.
Those on the course will get a chance to animate the iconic character Morph, in the studio he was made.
They will be taught by Will Becher, who has been with Aardman for more than 25 years and directed the Oscar-nominated A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon.
Simpson started her Da Local Yokel enterprise more than ten years ago, with a focus on creating custom-made, eye-catching bobblehead figures of people out of polymer clay.
More recently she has stopped taking custom orders and is instead, in her “semi-retirement”, focusing on making bobblehead figures of people she admires.
This has included one of David Attenborough, which she managed to send off to him – and the legendary naturalist even wrote a letter back to Simpson to thank her, which is now framed.
Her journey with clay can be traced back further than the bobbleheads, though, with Simpson once involved in a Young Enterprise group which made trows.
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She said there were plans to a create stop-motion animation for them, “but it never really happened’.
However, post-Aardman Simpson has something up her sleeve which will allow her to dabble in stop-motion animation.
She has written a children’s book in Shetland dialect called Da Gansey Gang & Da Magic Croft, featuring characters such as Winnie Wirsit and Tammy Tushkar.
The story is “ready and written”, with hopes for a book to be published next year – and the idea is to create series of stop-motion animations too.
For now, though, Simpson has the Aardman course to focus on – an opportunity she says she is “super excited” for.
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