Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D artwork or model positions in order to create an illusion of movement. It is an optical illusion of motion due to the phenomenon of persistence of vision. This could be anything from a flip book to a motion picture film.

Early animation

    Further information: History of animation

There is no single person who can be considered the "creator" of the art of animation, as there were several people doing several projects which could be considered various types of animation all around the same time. (Short, hand-drawn animation scenes could be presented with the Phenakistoscope, the Zoetrope, and other optical "toys" already in the early 1800s.)

The following is a brief listing on those who are often acknowledged as significant to the development of animation. Note that this list is by no means a comprehensive list of contributors.

Georges Méliès was a creator of special effect films, such as A Trip to the Moon. He used many techniques – one of which was to stop the camera rolling, change something in the scene, and then continue rolling the film. This is a very similar idea to that of stop-motion animation. Méliès accidentally happened upon the technique when his camera broke down while shooting a bus driving by. When the camera was fixed, a horse happened to be passing by just as Méliès continued to film. The result was that the bus appeared to change into a horse.

J. Stuart Blackton was possibly the first filmmaker in America to use the techniques of stop-motion and hand-drawn animation. Introduced to filmmaking by Edison, he pioneered these concepts at the turn of the 20th century, with his first copyrighted work dated 1900.

Émile Cohl began drawing cartoon strips and created a film in 1908 called Fantasmagorie. The film largely consisted of a stick figure moving about and encountering all manner of morphing objects, such as a wine bottle that transforms into a flower. There were also sections of live action where the animator’s hands would enter the scene. The film was created by drawing each frame on paper and then shooting each frame onto negative film, which gave the picture a blackboard look.

An art gallery or art museum is a space for the exhibition of art, usually visual art, and usually primarily paintings. Sculpture, photographs, illustrations, and objects from the applied arts may also be shown.[1] The term is used both for both public galleries, which are museums for the display of a permanent collection of art, and private galleries, which are commercial enterprises for the sale of art. However both types of gallery may host temporary exhibitions including art borrowed from elsewhere.

The rooms in museums where art is displayed for the public are often referred to as galleries as well, with a room dedicated to Ancient Egyptian art often being called the Egypt Gallery, for example.

The term contemporary art gallery refers to a usually a privately-owned for-profit commercial gallery. These galleries are often found clustered together in urban centers such as the Chelsea district of New York City, widely considered to be the center of the contemporary art world. Most large urban areas have several private art galleries, and most towns will be home to at least one. However, they may also be found in small communities, and remote areas where artists congregate, i.e. the Taos art colony and St Ives, Cornwall. Contemporary art galleries are usually open to the general public without charge, however some are semi-private. They usually profit by taking a cut of the art's sales; from 25 to 50% is usual. There are also many not-for-profit and art-collective galleries. Some galleries in cities like Tokyo charge the artists a flat rate per day, though this is considered distasteful in some international art markets. Galleries often hang solo shows. Curators often create group shows that say something about a certain theme, trend in art, or group of associated artists. Galleries often choose to represent artists exclusively, giving them the opportunity to show regularly. One idiosyncrasy of contemporary art galleries is their aversion to signing business contracts, although this seems to be changing.

Although primarily concerned with providing a space to show works of visual art, art galleries are sometimes used to host other artistic activities, such as music concerts or poetry readings. Conversely, some works of visual art are not shown in a gallery. In particular, works on paper, such as drawings and old master prints are considered by curators as unable to be permanently displayed for conservation reasons. Instead any collection is held in a print room in the museum. Murals generally remain where they have been painted, although many have been removed to galleries. Various forms of 20th century art, such as land art and performance art, also usually exist outside a gallery. Photographic records of these kinds of art are often shown in galleries, however. Most large museum art galleries own more works than they have room to display. The rest are held in reserve collections, on or off-site.

Similar to an art gallery is the sculpture garden (or sculpture park), which presents sculpture in an outdoor space. Sculpture installation has grown in popularity, whereby temporary sculptures are installed in open spaces during events like festivals.