Academy Unveils 2022 Student Academy Award Winners

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced this year’s winners of the Student Oscars on Thursday evening, and several animation filmmakers were recognized.

This year, the Student Academy Awards received 1,796 entries from 614 colleges and universities around the world.

From Griffith Film School in Australia, Lachlan Pendragon was also recognized for her short An Ostrich Told Me the World Is Fake and I Think I Believe It, in which a young office worker who uncovers the flaws in his stop-motion universe thanks to assistance from a talking ostrich.

In the animation category, Jan Gadermann and Sebastian Gadow from Konrad Wolf Film University of Babelsberg were awarded for their short Laika & Nemo, about a boy who feels left out because nobody but him wears a diving suit. Everything changes when Nemo meets Laika, an astronaut with a unique suit of his own.

The trio of Yanis Belaid, Eliott Benard, and Nicolas Mayeur from Pôle 3D Digital & Creative School in France were the third and final Oscar winners in the animation category. Their film, The Seine’s Tears, unspools in 1961 as “Algerian workers” take to the streets to protest a mandatory curfew imposed by the police.

Olivia Peace was the lone winner from the alternative/experimental category for her work on Against Reality. Peace’s University of Southern California thesis project is an autobiographical short. The work, which was created using AI art-generation tools, also appeared at the Toronto International Film Festival this month.

For the first time since 2019, student winners are invited to an in-person ceremony on Thursday, October 20, in Los Angeles. The medal placements — gold, silver, and bronze — will be announced there.

The ceremony is free and open to the public, but advance tickets are required.  Tickets may be obtained here.

2022 Student Oscar Winners

Alternative/Experimental

• Olivia Peace, “Against Reality,” University of Southern California

Animation

• Lachlan Pendragon, An Ostrich Told Me the World Is Fake and I Think I Believe It (Griffith Film School, Australia)
• Jan Gadermann, Sebastian Gadow, Laika & Nemo (Konrad Wolf Film University of Babelsberg, Germany)
• Yanis Belaid, Eliott Benard, Nicolas Mayeur The Seine’s Tears (Pôle 3D Digital & Creative School, France)