Stephen Quay
- Director
- Animation Department
- Cinematographer
The identical twin Brothers Quay (the other being Timothy) were born
near Philadelphia in a town with a large European immigrant population,
which fuelled their interest in European (especially Eastern European)
culture. They moved to London in the late 1960s to study at the Royal
College of Art where they made their first short films (now lost), and
after spending some time in Holland in the 1970s they returned to
London to team up with fellow RCA alumnus Keith Griffiths who would act as
producer on all their subsequent films. They spent the 1980s making TV
commercials (Honeywell, Walkers Crisps, Dulux Wood Protection) and
music videos (most famously, part of Peter Gabriel's 'Sledgehammer') in
order to support their personal projects, mostly based around their
trademark puppet animation and typically drawing on obscure literary
sources (Bruno Schulz, Robert Walser Michel de Ghelderode). 1995 saw the
premiere of their first feature, the almost entirely live-action (but
still distinctively Quayesque) 'Institute Benjamenta'.
