Love & Theft

„And I'm still carrying the gift you gave,
It's a part of me now, it's been cherished and saved,
It'll be with me unto the grave
And then unto eternity."
(Bob Dylan)

Script, direction: Andreas Hykade
Design, animation: Andreas Hykade
Animation assistance: Angela Steffen
Art work: Natalia Eck
Compositing: Christof Hoffmann
Sound, Music: Heiko Maile
Funding: MFG and FFA
Production assistance: Simone Fischer
Production: Thomas Meyer-Hermann
Studio FILM BILDER 2010

Awards:
Best Of Fest Award, Animation Festival Melbourne, 2011
Grand Prix Award, Anima, Brussels, 2011
Special Award, Animation Festival Anilogue, Budapest, 2010
German Short Film Award, Hamburg, 2010
Special Award for Best Animation, Animation Festival Animanima, Cacak, 2010
Grand Prix Award, Animation Festival, Bradford, 2010
Honorable Mention, Animadrid, Madrid, 2010
High Risk Award, Fantoche, Baden, 2010
Music Award, Animator Festival, Poznan, 2010
Music Award, International Film Festival Annecy, 2010
Music Award, International Short Film Festival Hamburg, 2010
Special Award, Animafest Zagreb, 2010
Music for Animation Award, Festival of Animated Film Stuttgart, 2010
Honorable Mention, Ars Electronica, Linz, Austria, 2010

[JacobJAMS]

All it takes is less than a second for the mind to recognize pop culture icons, and familiar imagery. This artist breaks down those images into their most basic features, and displays each in an incredibly short loop. Just enough time for your eyes to recognize what you've seen.
One of the most fantastic animations I've seen in a while! truly incredible, I hope the absolute best for the future of this artist.

[RadioForYahweh]

The amount of talent to pull this off left me in awe. What a wild and beautiful ride of emotion and art. Bravo madam.

[JavaDoodles]

Still one of my favorite animated films ever.

[lebensartqp]

9 years later this is still one of my fav videos on youtube. Emotionally perfect combined video and music :)

[skuncle]

Imagine if Andreas Hykade and Felix Colgrave collaborated on a short. That would be AMAZING.

[Bill-ouzp]

to me it represented to loss of childhood innocence.

[reyla]

I see this as how some pieces of art help an artist to form another. Like, admiration leads one to inspiration. But sometimes that inspiration leaves so much ink in another', s creation that we come to see more equals than diferents. That's when we start to look to deep into somethings...trying to see relations where there is none, just to call It theft.
But in the end, every art is the same, and one of a kind, at the same time.
Love and theft.
Love something. Let it inspire you to create something your own. See people call It theft.

[meganm]

I can see this playing on adult swim 😂

[shawdow]

Odd, I don't remember taking acid today.

[uncomfortablespencer]

this is really cool but kinda terrifying at the same time

[Settiis]

Everyone is praising the visuals, and rightfully so. But we need to praise the asbolutely AMAZING sound mastering too.

[JP-llyk]

I believe this video is trying to portray that all idea, whether it be the most blissful, carnal, and concrete thoughts come from the same place as the distraught, Savage, menacing thoughts. They're two sides of the same coin, one subject with two extremes, and that subject is expressed in all of us in different ways; yet it is all the same thing.

Life is Sex, by the way, if you haven't noticed yet. That's why there's so much imagery of it.

[jellybeesplease]

I keep finding myself coming back to this video. I can't quite explain how or why...

[SecondSaviour]

I absolutley love the obscure suggestive imagery. It gives the video an entire new level of strange yet interesting.

[rocky]

this is what my hallucinations look like, haunting the insides of my eyelids as i try to sleep, especially once it gets faster at 4:00

[Griggs]

This is a masterpiece and I found it unfair that the ones that are thankful are them, I would like to say Thank you for this gift:

Andreas,
Heiko,
Angela,
Natalia,
Marten,
Christof,
Anselm,
Anna,
Tobias,
Ralf,
SimoneNO!
Thank you!
Andreas,
Heiko,
Angela,
Natalia,
Marten,
Christof,
Anselm,
Anna,
Tobias,
Ralf,
Simone,
Thomas,
And the whole team. 😄

[SkeetRadar]

the amount of symbolism in this video is very high

[duskdawn]

I had to view this video twice to sort of take it all in. To me, this video visually conceptualizes - Life. It begins with the joining of the chromosomes and the embryonic cells developing into an infant. You see the development of the child, with all of his/her innoncence, eventually grow into adolescence and struggle between the letting-go-of the innocence to join the league of adulthood - the "Big Leagues" if you will. This all yields itself to the inevitable rigors that one deals with and works through during adulthood - the struggle of self & identity, the pain of loss, the living with stress and worry, etc. But it's not all bad. The man - or woman - finds a partner, or a love, or a passion, builds a family, and carries out it's legacy, serving it's primal purpose on Earth. It closes with the bittersweet, yet inevitable, truth we all know will come to all of us - death. But with this I take away a feeling of joy in knowing that I can share experiences with others and impart my ideas, beliefs, etc. But I'd love to hear everyone else's take on this. It is - after all - art, & is meant to open a table for discussion. - Andres

[SpiderBubblegumvideos]

Came back again for another comment on this video: it seems like this short animated film represents how I have emotions and how I feel the world around me: weird, dissociative, always transforming, scary then gentle then scary again. I am never on acid or anything like this but man, this video explains so much how I feel almost every day of my life.
(August 2024: Now that it's highly possible that I am on the Autism Spectrum, man, it explains a lot).

[benjamintupman]

Thank you YouTube algorithm, for knowing me better than I know myself.