Director, Animator, Cinematographer

(b. August 1, 1940 Amsterdam, The Netherlands)

Co Hoedeman specializes in three-dimensional animation with a mature and unique sense of comic fantasy, using a wide range of techniques and materials: twisted wire in Oddball (1969), wooden dolls in Matrioska (1970), puppets in Le Hibou et le lemming (1971), sculpted sand in the Academy Award®-winning The Sand Castle (1977) and foam rubber in The Treasure of the Grotoceans (1980).

Harmony, humour, practicality and ingenuity are at the heart of Hoedeman’s work. Although his films are children’s fables, they contain almost a surreal aura of mystery and complexity that also endears them to an adult audience. The creatures in his films seem to have sprung from the most idiosyncratic recesses of a child’s imagination, and their personalities and characteristics are accentuated by Hoedeman’s mastery of the craft of puppet animation.

Following his academic studies and courses in photography, Hoedeman began his career as an assistant animator at Multifilm (now Cinecentrum) in the Netherlands. He left for Canada in 1965 and began working at the National Film Board. After a try-out as an assistant on educational films, he found a permanent home in French production as a full-time animator in 1968, when he completed his first film, Continental Drift.

Hoedeman also photographed Bernard Longpré’s Monsieur Pointu (1975) and animated Paul Driessen’s Une histoire comme une autre (1981). The NFB produced a film on his work, Co Hoedeman, animateur (1980), which includes extracts from his films and a section showing him working on a short animation sequence using foam rubber. Since the mid-nineties, he has focused his professional efforts on his series of popular, award-winning Ludovic children’s films.

Film and video work includes

Continental Drift, 1968 (director; writer; animator)
Le Beau Plaisir, 1968 (co-animator with Clorinda Warny)
DNA, 1969 (cinematographer)
Oddball, 1969 (director; writer)
Matrioska, 1970 (director; co-animator with Jana Bendova)
Le Hibou et le lemming: une légende eskimo, 1971 (director; animator)
Tchou-tchou, 1972 (director; writer)
Le Hibou et le corbeau: une légende eskimo, 1973 (director; animator)
Lumaaq: une légende eskimo, 1975 (director; animator)
L'Homme et le géant: une légende eskimo, 1975 (director)
Légendes et réalities inuit, 1978 (animator)
Co Hoedeman, animateur, 1980 (animator; appears as himself)
Canada Vignettes: Dancing Dolls, 1980 (co-animator with Jana Bendova)
Le Trésor des Grotocéans/The Treasure of the Grotoceans, 1980 (director; animator)
Une histoire comme une autre, 1981 (animator)
Masquerade, 1984 (director; writer; co-animator with Nina May)
Charles and François, 1987 (director)
La Boîte/The Box, 1989 (director)
L'Ours renifleur/The Sniffing Bear, 1992 (director; writer; animator; cinematographer)
Le Jardin d'Écos, 1997 (director; writer; animator)
Ludovic - The Snow Gift, 1998 (director; co-writer with Marie-Francine Hébert; co-animator with Lilian Kruip; cinematographer)
Coucou l'ourson!, 1999 (co-director with par Munro Ferguson and Pierre M. Trudeau)
Ludovic - A Crocodile in My Garden, 2000 (director; co-writer with Marie-Francine Hébert; co-animator with Lilian Kruip; cinematographer)
Ludovic - Visiting Grandpa, 2001 (director; co-writer with Marie-Francine Hébert; co-animator with Lilian Kruip; cinematographer)
Ludovic - Magic in the Air, 2002 (director; co-writer with Marie-Francine Hébert; co-animator with Lilian Kruip; cinematographer)