Kaj Pindal Award
The Kaj Pindal Animated Person of the Year Award is given in honour to an individual or a group of individuals who make a lasting impression and uplift the world of animation through their work.
Past recipients include namesake Kaj Pindal, Ray Harryhausen, Marv Newland, Dean DeBlois, Blair Kitchen and Gerald Potterton.
Domee Shi - 2022 Recipient
This year we are honored to present the Kaj Pindal Person of the Year award to local hero, Director & Vice President, Creative - Domee Shi.
Domee Shi began as a story intern at Pixar Animation Studios in June 2011, and was soon hired as a story artist on the Academy Award®-winning feature film “Inside Out.” Since then, she has worked on the feature films “The Good Dinosaur,” “Incredibles 2” and the Academy Award®-winning “Toy Story 4.”
In 2015 she began pitching ideas for short films, and soon was green lit to write and direct “Bao” which won the Academy Award® for Best Animated Short Film. In her role as a Creative VP, Shi is involved in key creative decision-making at the studio and consults on films in both development and production. Shi make her feature film directorial debut on “Turning Red,” which released March 11, 2022.
Shi graduated from the animation program at Sheridan College where she was fueled by her love of anime/manga, Disney, and Asian cinema influences that can be seen in her work to this day.
Shi was born in Chongqing, China and resided in Toronto, Canada most of her life. She currently lives in Oakland, California and notes that her love of animation is only rivaled by her love of cats.
Kaj Pindal | 1927-2019
Born and raised in Denmark, animation great Kaj Pindal spent most of his long career in Canada, where he is best known for award winning work ranging from such NFB shorts as What on Earth, to the PBS series based on his most beloved character, Peep. He is also well remembered and deeply missed as a teacher of animation, particularly for his time on faculty at Sheridan where he inspired 100’s of students to, themselves, strive for greatness.
