Raoul Servais

Raoul Servais (Belgium, 1928-2023) is considered a pioneer of animated film, whose oeuvre is renowned around the world: it received over sixty prizes, including the Palme d’Or at Cannes for Harpya in 1979. Servais made sixteen short films and the feature film Taxandria (1994), a combination of live-action and animation. The same technical process, also dubbed Servaisgraphy, was successfully applied in Nocturnal Butterflies (1998), a nostalgic evocation of the world of painter Paul Delvaux.

© Nocturnal Butterflies (Raoul Servais, 1997)
Nocturnal Butterflies
Raoul Servais, Belgium, 1997, 7'

Nocturnal Butterflies is the only film entirely made in Servaisgraphy, a technique that fuses live-action and animation. The late Raoul Servais, a key figure in the history of Belgian animation, already experimented with this style in his film Harpya.

© Sirène (Raoul Servais, 1968)
KIJKWATCH
Sirens
Raoul Servais, Belgium, 1968, 9'

A lonesome angler becomes witness to an eccentric idyll between a cabin boy and a mermaid. Dream or reality?