Don Hertzfeldt, animator of existential depth, brings masterwork to Fantasia Festival

Don Hertzfeldt is bringing his hand-drawn philosophy to Montreal for the first time in more than 20 years. The American animator will receive Fantasia Festival's 2026 Indie Maverick award on July 23, during a masterclass followed by a screening of his latest short film, Paper Trail.

Hertzfeldt has built one of animation's most distinctive careers on a deceptively simple principle: one idea, developed with precision and vision, can reshape how people perceive the world. His 2012 feature It's Such a Beautiful Day became a cult classic, blending abstract stick-figure characters with moments of profound existential meditation and unexpected humour. Since leaving UC California in 1998, he has made roughly 15 films, earned two Oscar nominations, and won two Grand Prix awards at Sundance — a record no other animator holds.

Paper Trail, which won Sundance's Jury Award for Creative Vision, reconstructs a person's life through their drawings and the paper traces they leave behind. The film opens with blue paint strokes on white, resembling footprints or action painting, before accelerating into lines that form letters and images. The aesthetic borrows from early cinema, where a single visual idea carries the entire emotional weight.

Hertzfeldt remains notoriously selective about interviews and public appearances. When asked what he plans to discuss during the Montreal masterclass, he deflected: "I prefer that the public decides what we're going to talk about." His reluctance to self-promote hasn't hindered his reach — after Rejected (2000), a faux animation-studio compilation that became one of the first viral shorts online, he began distributing his work on YouTube himself. His short World of Tomorrow (2015) has accumulated more than one million views since posting.

The filmmaker adopted digital animation relatively late, switching from 35mm film to digital tools in 2024 and still using software from 2009. His absence from Montreal marks two decades since he last visited the city, shortly after Rejected reshaped his career. The Fantasia screening and masterclass will be his return.