Drawn from memory: Animation, memory, and the construction of 'the real' in documentary filmmaking

Pentz, Mia

Drawn from memory: Animation, memory, and the construction of 'the real' in documentary filmmaking

Thesis / Dissertation

2026

Publisher

University of Cape Town

Department

Centre for Film and Media Studies

Faculty

Faculty of Humanities

Abstract

My short documentary, A Small Place (Pentz, 2025) , is the creative research component of my Master's in Documentary Arts, accompanied by this practice-led written explication. The 25-minute film follows Aletta and Dudley Wessels, long-time residents of Koiingnaas - a once-thriving, company-owned mining town on South Africa's West Coast, now left desolate following the closure of diamond mining operations. By making use of ‘overlay' animated sequences of their nostalgic recollections over stark present-day live-action visuals, I explore how both documentary storytelling and human memory are continuously reshaped by perspective, emotional context, and broader cultural narratives. In this explication, I critically reflect on A Small Place within an interdisciplinary framework that combines documentary film theory (Bruzzi, 2000; Nichols, 2017), animation studies (Ward, 2011; Honess Roe, 2013) and memory research (Halbwachs, 1992; Loftus & Davis, 2006). I argue that animation, specifically ‘overlay animation' through the lens of memory mapping, expands documentary's representational toolkit and highlights the reconstructed nature of documentary narratives and memory itself. Through an analysis of my film, A Small Place (Pentz, 2025) , as a case study, as well as two additional comparisons, Liyana (Kopp & Kopp, 2017) and William Kentridge's short film History of the Main Complaint (1996), I explore how animation can function as a tool for visualising subjective, emotional, and intangible aspects of human experience. Rather than undermining ideas of ‘actuality' or the ‘real,' the deliberate artifice of animation makes the creative interpretation inherent in documentary filmmaking visible. This transparency corresponds with Halbwachs's emphasis on the social construction of memory and aligns with Loftus's findings on the evolving character of recollection over time. Building on these theoretical perspectives, this explication foregrounds the parallels between recalling memories, documentary filmmaking, frame-by-frame animation, and the curated environment of company-owned mining towns such as Koiingnaas - each relying on narratives shaped by emotion, social context, and time. Thus, I pursue my central research aim - how animation can illuminate the reconstructed nature of both memory and documentary - while prompting a broader interrogation of where ‘the real' resides in our recollections and the institutional frameworks that govern them.

Keywords

documentary

creative research

Reference:

Collections

Masters

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