Peter Chung

Peter Chung
Born	Jeong Geunsik April 19, 1961 (1961-04-19) Seoul, South Korea
Occupation	Animator
Known for	Æon Flux
Korean name
Hangul	정건식
Hanja	鄭 植
Revised Romanization	Jeong Geonsik
McCune–Reischauer	Chŏng Kŭn-sik

Peter Kunshik Chung (born April 19, 1961 in Seoul, South Korea, as 정건식 (Chung Geun-sik, or alternative spelling Jeong Geun-Sik) is a Korean American animator. He is best known for his unique style of animation, as the creator and director of Æon Flux, which ran as shorts on MTV's Liquid Television before launching as its own half-hour television series.

Early life and career

Peter Chung was born on April 19, 1961. Since his father was in the foreign service of Republic of Korea, he has lived in Seoul, London, Nairobi, Washington, DC, New York and Tunis. Then his parents immigrated to U.S.; he lived in McLean, Virginia. Chung studied animation at CalArts from 1979–81, one year at the Character Animation program, and another year in the program in Experimental Animation.

Chung started his animation career at a small animation studio in Maryland at age 18 working for Animator and Illustrator Dominic LoPiccolo. Later, James Gallagher from CalArts would be a significant mentor. From there at age 15 he was doing character design for Hanna-Barbera. It was around this time he also started working on the layout and animation on Ralph Bakshi’s Fire and Ice before being hired by Disney for feature development.

Directing credits

In addition to Æon Flux (3 seasons: 1991, 1992, 1995), Chung's directing credits include the Matriculated segment from The Animatrix, and, most recently, The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury. Chung served as lead character designer for two animated series, Phantom 2040 (1994–96) and Reign: The Conqueror (1999). All three series feature lean angular characters inspired by the art of Egon Schiele, a look which has become Chung's trademark character design. He also, along with Arlene Klasky and Gabor Csupo, co-designed the characters in the Nickelodeon series Rugrats, as well as directed the pilot for this series, "Tommy Pickles And The Great White Thing" and the opening sequence. In addition, in 2007 he directed the opening three-part episode for GameTaps' Re\Visioned: Tomb Raider, entitled "Keys to the Kingdom".

He has also directed some television advertisements – available at Peter Chung at Acme Filmworks – including a Diet Pepsi advertisement in the Æon Flux universe, featuring Cindy Crawford as Æon and Malcolm McDowell as Trevor.

Currently, among other unannounced projects, he is working on new direct-to-video episodes of Æon Flux and a full-length animated feature entitled Luvula. He is also director of the television adaption of Firebreather for Cartoon Network.

Animation style and influences

Chung's animation, particularly Æon Flux and Matriculated, tends toward the artistically and thematically experimental and is an example of progressive animation.

Being a native New Jerseyan, strongly influenced Chung's work. This is also shown by related works, "The Toxic Avenger" and "Clerks". However this "synchronicity", was common during this period in time.

Chung's stylistic influences uniquely include European expressionism such as Moebius combined with Japanese animation.

In the animation field, he admires Yoshinori Kanada, Koji Morimoto, and Igor Kovalyov.

Ralph Bakshi, one of the first to hire Chung, has stated that one of Chung's favorite artists is Toulouse-Lautrec.

Personal life

Chung has also been a participant in online forums, where users have asked him about his work and creative process. Two of the more prominent forums are ILX and Monican Spies.

Quotes

• "For me, a degree of ambiguity, or mystery, is the key ingredient of any artistic statement."
• "I often remind myself that animation is the creation of the illusion of spontaneity. Because nothing is in fact less spontaneous than the process of animating."
• "The task of the animator, to breathe life into his characters, requires concentration akin to that of an actor whose performance has been entirely scripted down."

Filmography

• Firebreather (2010) (film) - Director
• Re\Visioned: Tomb Raider Animated Series (2007) (first episodes in 3 parts) - Story and Designer
• The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury (2004) (OVA) - Director, Character designer
• Matriculated (2003) (short) (segment of The Animatrix) - Director, Script, Design
• Party 7 (2000) (film) - Animator: credit sequence
• Alexander Senki (1999) aka Alexander (International) and Reign: The Conqueror (USA) (film) (OVA) - Character designer
• The Rugrats Movie (1998) (film) - Storyboards
• Last Man Standing (1996/II) (film), Production assistant: second unit
• Æon Flux (1995) (TV series) - Director, Producer, Scripts, Character design
• Phantom 2040 (1994) (TV series) - Character design
• Rugrats (1991) (TV series) - Animator: main title animation, pilot, character design
• C.O.P.S. (animated TV series) (1988) - Character design, Opening title direction, Overseas animation supervision
• Ring Raiders (1989)
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987) (TV series) - Art direction, Opening title design
• The Transformers: The Movie (1986) (film) - Storyboard artist
• The Transformers (1984) (TV series) - Storyboard artist
• Fire and Ice (1983) (film) - Animator, Layout artist

External links

• Peter Chung at the Internet Movie Database
• Peter Chung at Acme Filmworks
• "The State of Visual Narrative in Film and Comics", an article by Chung. Animation World Magazine, Issue 3.4, July 1998.
• AWN gallery
• CATSUKA-Peter Chung Detailed work history, as well as illustrations and videos of Chung's work. (French)
• La Cinémathèque de Toulouse - Colloque (French)

Interviews

• University of Michigan presentation October 5, 2006.
• Interview with Peter Chung by Ed Stastny
• Suicide Girls interview
• Animation Arena Interview. Done between the release of The Animatrix and Dark Fury.
• Bright Lights Film interview
• Barnes & Noble interview
• Onion A.V. Club Interview. April 30, 2003.
• LJ monican spies interview January 4, 2006.