Posted August 24, 2009.
The School of Art and Art History is proud to present Pixar: A Design Story a lecture by Jay Shuster, art director for Pixar Animation Studios, at 3 p.m., on Thursday, Sept. 3, at the Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art. This lecture is free and open to the public; seating is limited.
The title of the film Planes, Trains & Automobiles might just be the perfect description for Pixar Animation Studios Artist Shuster’s childhood in Birmingham, Mich. As the son of a car designer, Shuster’s childhood bedroom was a nest of blue prints, drawings, posters, machines and models of all things connected with nearly every mode of mechanized transportation.
But it wasn’t until Shuster saw Star Wars that he connected his interests to a possible future in the film industry, where he saw an opportunity to work in an unrestrained creative culture. That desire initially took him to Lucasfilm Ltd., where he designed a variety of vehicles and environments for the Star Wars prequel film trilogy.
Shuster arrived at Pixar in 2002 as a sketch artist contributing character and environment designs to John Lasseter's 2006 film, CARS, and Andrew Stanton's WALL-E in 2008. He is currently art directing on Disney-Pixar’s 2011's sequel to CARS.
Shuster graduated in 1993 from the industrial design program at College for Creative Studies in Detroit. He currently resides in San Francisco, Calif.
The lecture will be presented in the Mary Eddy and Fred Jones Auditorium. The Fred Jones Jr. Museum of Art is located in the OU Arts District on the corner of Elm Avenue and Boyd Street, at 555 Elm Ave., on the OU Norman campus.
Admission to the museum is free to all OU students with a current student ID and all museum association members, $5 for adults, $4 for seniors, $3 for children 6 to 17 years of age, $2 for OU faculty/staff, and free for children 5 and under. Admission is free on Tuesdays.
The University of Oklahoma is an equal opportunity institution. For accommodations on the basis of disability, please call the School of Art and Art History at (405) 325-2691. For more information, please visit, http://art.ou.edu/.