- Raoul Servais was one of the most notable Belgian animators in the world.
- President of ASIFA (international association of film animators). Teacher at the Akademie voor Schone Kunsten (Ghent, Belgium), where he was also taught. Founder of het" Belgisch Animatiefilm Centrum" (the Centre Belge du Film d'Animation) (Ghent, Flanders, Belgium) in 1976. Involved in Raoul Servais' Foundation, which organizes animation courses for elementary schools and highschools.
- Has one child: a son, who also draws
- He was a Belgian filmmaker, animator, and comics artist.
- In total, Servais received about 60 film prizes.
- At the 9th Magritte Awards, he received an Honorary Magritte Award from the Académie André Delvaux.
- Homages for him with retrospectives were organized in Paris, Madrid, Istanbul, Montreal, New York, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Rio de Janeiro and St Petersburg.
- He is best known for the 1979 animated film, Harpya for which he won a Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.
- He was born in Ostend, Belgium, and is a fundamental figure of the Belgian animation scene, as well as the founder of the animation faculty of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts (KASK).
- Servais received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the World Festival of Animated Film - Animafest Zagreb in 2016.
- Raoul Servais was born in 1928 in Ostend, hence his nickname "The Wizard of Ostend".
- In 1960, Servais became an art teacher at his former school, the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent. Three years later, he founded the university's first course in animation. This was not only a scoop for Belgian universities, but also the first school of its kind on the European Continent.
- His job as art teacher allowed Servais to hone his technical skills and raise money to make his own cartoons.
- His father was an amateur film director who frequently showed pictures by Charlie Chaplin, Charles Vanel and cartoons of Pat Sullivan and Otto Messmer's 'Felix the Cat' in his local film theater. This inspired Servais to become an animator.
- Earlier in his career, Servais also drew a short-running comic series named 'Pol en Piet' (1953), which ran in the magazine Vriendschap.
- While he was best known as an animator, Servais has also made live-action films. Still, these pictures often used hand-designed graphics, sets, backgrounds, special effects and occasional animation.
- His debut, 'Spokenhistorie' was filmed with a camera made out of a cigar box.
- His debut film 'Havenlichten' ('Harbor Lights', 1960) was somewhat clumsy in certain fields, but showed enough promise to win First Prize at the National Festival of Belgian Film in Antwerp. Servais invested the prize money in his next animated film, 'De Valse Noot' ('The False Note', 1963), which won the "Best Animated Film" award at the Benelux Film Festival in 's Hertogenbosch, the Netherlands.
- He made several classic shorts, which often experimented with graphic style, animation technique and/or content.
- His 1966 movie Chromophobia made a strong stance against war and tyranny, a theme that would run through his next cartoons as well, such as 'Sirene' (1968), 'To Speak or Not to Speak' (1970) and 'Operation X-70' (1971), the latter receiving the Prix Spécial du Jury at the Cannes Film Festival and the First Prize at the International Film Festival of Animation in Zagreb.
- 'Sirene' (1966) was an unexpected succcess in Iran and Servais was invited by empress Farah Diba with the request to create an animation school in Teheran, an offer he politely refused.
- Servais would also teach at the Institut Supérieur de la Cambre in Brussels. One of his pupils who later became famous as a cartoonist was Kim Duchateau.
- Among his best regarded films are 'Chromophobia' (1966), 'To Speak or Not tot Speak' (1970) and the Palme d'Or for 'Best Short' winner 'Harpya' (1979).
- He was also active as an illustrator and co-transponed designs by Belgian surrealist painter René Magritte on the walls of a circular room in the casino of Knokke. Despite having an argument with the maestro about technical aspects of the decoration, Servais still regarded Magritte as one of his graphic influences, along with that other Belgian surrealist icon, Paul Delvaux.
- Hungry for more reliable information and equipment, Servais went so far to disguise himself as a journalist and visit both Ray Goossens' animation studio in Antwerp and the Gémeaux Studios in Paris, founded by Paul Grimault. While his ploy managed to fool everyone, he still wasn't allowed inside the actual animators' department. Hungry for more reliable information and equipment, Servais went so far to disguise himself as a journalist and visit both Ray Goossens' animation studio in Antwerp and the Gémeaux Studios in Paris, founded by Paul Grimault. While his ploy managed to fool everyone, he still wasn't allowed inside the actual animators' department.
- From 'Goldframe' (1969) on, which won the Special Jury Prize at the International Film Festival of Sydney, Servais regularly surprised his audience by drastically changing his graphic style and animation techniques. One can often hardly tell it's made by the same director. The animated cartoon 'To Speak or Not To Speak' (1970) was notable for featuring characters talking in speech balloons on screen, showing his debt to the comics medium.
- When he purchased a "professional" camera in the 1950s, it was a model made in 1928, his birth year.
- Servais was also briefly active in comics. As a member of the Belgian Socialist Party, he published comics in their magazines Vooruit, Le Peuple and Germinal. One of his gag series was 'Pol en Piet' (1953) in the magazine Vriendschap. It centered around an identical twin. However, he soon turned his back on the medium, feeling comics weren't really his thing. 'Pol en Piet' was therefore continued for a short while by Jean de Cocq. Only in 1981 did Servais make a comic drawing again to celebrate the 35th anniversary of the magazine Tintin. It was a parody of Bob De Moor's series 'Barelli'.
- 'Chromophobia' (1966), winner of the Primo Premio at the International Filmfestival of Venice, was his international breakthrough.
- After World War II he studied decorative arts at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent. Together with some fellow students he founded his own amateur animation studio, but by lack of available information, they had to learn the craft entirely by self study.
- Between 2018 and 2021, an overview exposition of Servais' work, including drawings, designs and film fragments, was shown in a special wing of the Mu.ZEE in Ostend. Around the start of the exhibition, the documentary film 'Servais' (2018) by Rudy Pinceel premiered at the Ostend Film Festival.
- In 1979 Servais collaborated on the animated TV adaptation of GoT's children's comic 'Jonas en de Wonderwinkel', produced by PEN-film for the BRT.
- In 2005, Servais ended at the 108th place in the Flemish version of "De Grootste Belg" ("The Greatest Belgian") election.
- 'Nachtvlinders' ('Night Butterflies', 1998) was a homage to the work of the then recently deceased Belgian surrealist painter Paul Delvaux and received the Prize of International Film Criticism in Annecy, France.
- HIs final film was 'Der lange Kerl' (2022), which he co-directed with Rudy Pinceel.
- He has received a total of sixteen awards and four nominations. In 1998 he received the culture prize of the city of Ostend, and he received an honorary doctorate from Ghent University on 8 October 2008 during the Ghent Film Festival.
- Servais was co-founder of the animation studio PEN-film in Ghent in 1970. The studio regularly hired former students from the Ghent-based Academy as assistant directors and animators, including Dirk De Paepe, Paul De Meyer, Katrien Alliet, Catherine Vandamme, Jean-Pierre Van den Broecke and Eric Turc.
- Between 1985 and 1994, he was head of the International Association of Film Animators and co-founder of Het Vlaams Audiovisueel Fonds. Over the years, his duties slowed down the production of his new film projects.
- In 1995 he directed his first feature film, 'Taxandria' (1995), slightly based on François Schuiten and Benoît Peeters' comic strip 'Les Cités Obscures'. Schuiten was also the film's art director. The film also featured contributions by Etienne Schréder. Despite lukewarm reviews, the picture did win the Grand Award at the International Festival of the Fantastic Film in both Rome as well as Porto, Portugal.
- Animated backdrops put in front of live-action cut-outs, Servais dubbed this technique "Servaisgraphy" and used it again in his next two films, after his movie Harpya, until CGI technology made the process outdated.
- 'Atraksion' (2001) marked Servais' first experiments with digital media, featuring a group of chained prisoners trying to seek freedom by climbing to a huge light in the sky. It won the Special Jury Prize at the International Festival in Valladolid, the Grand Prize for Best Short and the Silver Méliès for Best European Fantastic Film in Porto.
- Two of Servais' former animators who'd also have an active comics career were Gilbert Declercq and Willy Verschelde.
- After a contribution to the anthology film 'Fuyo no hi' ('Winter Days', 2003) by Kihachiro Kawamoto, Servais directed 'Tank' (2015), an animated short set during the Battle of the Somme during World War I, to commemorate the 100th anniversary of that event. The picture won the Espiga de Plata at the International Film Festival of Valladolid.
- Servais' most famous work is the short 'Harpya' (1979), crowned with the Palme d'Or for "Best Short" at the Festival of Cannes. 'Harpya' follows a man who is plagued by a terrifying harpy. A horror movie to some, a black comedy to others, it effortlessly became a cult picture. Much of the scenery and atmosphere was inspired by the haunting paintings of Belgian surrealist Paul Delvaux. 'Harpya' was Servais' first live-action film, yet still used animated backdrops put in front of live-action cut-outs.
- As a pioneer he realised fifteen short animation films and one full-length film in an impressive way. From original idea to design drawing, from storyboard to painted animation cels, to film: everything carries its own personal signature.
- In 2008, Ghent University appointed Raoul Servais as Doctor Honoris Causa. He is a laureate of the Van Acker Prize (Bruges, 1975).
- In 2002 he was awarded the five-year culture prize of the province of West Flanders.
- He has won more than 60 international awards.
- He is co-founder of the Flemish Audiovisual Fund vzw, was vice-chairman of the Henri Storck Fund and is vice-chairman of the fund that bears his name.
- In 1963, Raoul Servais, with the support of director Geo Bontinck, founded an autonomous Animation Film department at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent, the first school of its kind on the European mainland.
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