Virtual Talk | Lotte Reiniger: Pioneer of Film Animation with Author and Historian Whitney Grace

2026 marks the 100th anniversary of Prince Achmed (1926), the world’s oldest surviving animated feature film. More remarkable than the film’s age is the story of its creator Lotte Reiniger, who wrote, directed, and animated the film using intricate figures that she painstakingly cut from cardboard in her home in post-World War I Germany—at a time when money and materials were in short supply and a documented case of a woman animation director had not yet emerged anywhere in the world. Join author and historian Whitney Grace as she shares Reiniger’s inspiring story of ingenuity and resilience.

Tickets for Virtual Talk | Lotte Reiniger: Pioneer of Film Animation with Author and Historian Whitney Grace will be available as follows:

• All member levels: Tickets available beginning Thursday, July 23 at noon PST via the Member Portal.
• Public (non-members): Remaining tickets available beginning Friday, July 24 at noon PST online.

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Whitney Grace is a professional writer, researcher, appraiser, and pop culture historian. Her literary accomplishments are the book Lotte Reiniger: Pioneer of Film Animation and her fantasy/horror novel Iron Impetigo. She hosts the Toon-In Talk Podcast and is pursuing a degree in gemology at the Gemological Institute of America (GIA). She’s currently working on a book about video game movies, animator Tissa David, and a sequel to Iron Impetigo.