Join CAPE and Baobab Studios for a special virtual screening of NAMOO, introduced by Executive Producer John Cho (SEARCHING, COWBOY BEBOP)! MTV News correspondent Yoonj Kim will lead a Q&A with the creative team behind the film, including Director/Writer Erick Oh, Producers Maureen Fan and Kane Lee, and Art Director Eusong Lee.
NAMOO ("Tree" in Korean) is an animated short directed by 2021 Oscar nominated Erick Oh (OPERA) and produced by 9x Emmy Award winning Baobab Studios. Inspired by the passing of Erick’s grandfather, NAMOO illustrates the journey of an artist — the beautiful and heartbreaking moments of a man's life — from beginning to end.
Erick Oh is a filmmaker whose films have been introduced and awarded at numerous festivals including the Annie Awards, Annecy International Animation Festival, Animafest-Zagreb, SIGGRAPH and Anima Mundi. With a background in fine art from Seoul National University and film school at UCLA, Erick became an animator at Pixar from 2010 to 2016. His recent project, OPERA, was nominated for this year’s Academy Award® for Best Animated Short. Erick joined Baobab Studios to create NAMOO and will be working on a variety of projects in film/animation and will also contribute to the contemporary art scene in the USA and South Korea.
Maureen Fan is CEO & Co-Founder of 9-time Emmy-award winning and leading independent interactive animation studio Baobab Studios, whose mission is to "Bring out your sense of wonder. Inspire you to dream. Make YOU matter.” Previously she was vice president of games at Zynga, where she oversaw three game studios including the FarmVille's, and she worked on Pixar's TOY STORY 3 film and at eBay in product management and UI design. Her collaboration, THE DAM KEEPER, was nominated for the 2015 Oscar Best Animated Short. Maureen was also named an Exec to Watch by Variety.
Kane Lee heads content at Baobab Studios and is a multi-Emmy Award-winning executive producer and producer of the studio’s groundbreaking works, from BABA YAGA (starring Kate Winslet, Daisy Ridley, Jennifer Hudson, Glenn Close) and CROW: THE LEGEND (starring John Legend, Oprah Winfrey), to JACK (starring Lupita Nyong’o) and most recently NAMOO. Previously Lee was Vice President at Jane Startz Productions, with credits including 20th Century Fox’s HORTON HEARS A WHO!, ICE AGE: THE MELTDOWN, and ROBOTS. He is an advisor in interactive media for the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences.
Eusong Lee is a director and an art director actively working in the US animation industry. After studying at CalArts, he began his career with the short film WILL (2012), which went on to win a Student Silver Oscar. Eusong continued directing at Jibjab and Chromosphere-LA on numerous shorts and opening title sequences, such as Storybots’ music videos (Netflix, 2016), CARMEN SANDIEGO (DHX, Netflix, 2019), GREEN EGGS AND HAM (WB, 2019), and Sprint Vector VR game (2018). On the art side, Eusong has been working on various formats of projects, such as VR, TV series to feature films as an art director, or a concept designer. Notable work would be POWERPUFF GIRLS reboot (2016) he art-directed and Glen Keane’s OVER THE MOON (2020) as a concept designer. Currently Eusong is working at Pixar as a senior designer.
Yoonj Kim is an award-winning journalist, correspondent, and producer who has reported from four continents. She has received recognition for her coverage of environmental and indigenous rights, drug trafficking, the housing crisis, and the 2020 presidential race. Currently she’s the Social Impact Correspondent at MTV News where she covers social and political issues for Millennials and Gen Z, and before that hosted documentaries for Playboy, Mic, and Pivot TV. Her awards include the 2017 Los Angeles Press Club Award for Best Investigative Series, the 2020 WOWIE Award for Outstanding Political Correspondent, and a Webby Honor. An immigrant from South Korea, Yoonj is the daughter of an anchorwoman and a dentist and holds a BS in Journalism from Northwestern University.