BIOGRAPHY
Tawd b. Dorenfeld
Filmmaker

Tawd b. Dorenfeld is one of the new crop of independent filmmakers currently working in Los Angeles.  He brings an already developed history of writing, directing, producing and animating to the entertainment industry.  He has become embedded in the independent and Hollywood film communities, as well as having completed projects for both the corporate and independent sides of the music industry.  And most recently Dorenfeld has been embraced by the highly recognized and competitive Los Angeles art gallery scene.  He has successfully linked his innovative visual and narrative styles to both an emerging social consciousness in his efforts on behalf of suicide prevention and in the work he has done generating curriculum for higher visual education at the pre-school level.

Dorenfeld received his B.F.A. in filmmaking from the prestigious New York University Tisch School of the Arts in the Spring of 1996.  During his early years of filmmaking in New York City, Dorenfeld created and animated several professional shorts, including the “Amoeba Al” public service announcement for New York City’s PBS station and an animated short for Branford Marsalis’ band Buckshot le Fonque, which aired on the Sony Big Screen TV in Times Square.

Since his relocation to Los Angeles, Dorenfeld has developed a children-oriented animated series for Dreamworks SKG; designed the photo-collages for the companion book to the Academy Award-nominated documentary “Ayn Rand: A Sense of Life”; directed numerous music videos and commercials for artists such as The Offspring, Zap Mama featuring Erykah Badu, The Sirens, Good Charlotte and Estradasphere who are contracted to record labels such as Columbia, Epic and Universal. During these same years he created and animated the “Sal & Su-ie” series for College Broadcast, a College TV station that broadcasts in 450 schools across the country as well as single handedly producing and creating “The Abc’s Game,” awarded Best Educational Animation Produced for the web in 2001 by The World Animation Celebration (Animation Magazine).

The Los Angeles art gallery scene opened its doors to Dorenfeld’s work this year with two highly prestigious one-month exhibits showing his new animation pieces. “Corporal Ballad” a framed animation loop exhibited and sold at Berman Turner Projects in Bergamot Station (Santa Monica, CA).  A second simultaneous exhibit of 25 minutes of Dorenfeld’s animations was featured for LACMA’s Art Walk, Niche LA co-founder’s of Gallery Row Downtown Los Angeles.

Most recently Dorenfeld has both been commissioned to direct and animate a Pre-School Level Short for Roseanne Barr in which he was honored to once again initiate a collaborative effort with animation partner MarsAttacks. As of July 2006 Dorenfeld has also been celebrated by the Silverlake Film Festival & MP4 Festival with a 2 hour retrospective screening and has been titled the “inaugural Flash artist” for the 7th Annual Silverlake Film Festival/MP4 Festival, March 2007.

Concurrent to all the activities connected to his rapidly growing commercial, and music video career, Dorenfeld wrote, directed, produced, animated and edited his first feature length film titled “The Anna Cabrini Chronicles.” The project is of epic proportions for an independent director. He recently  orchestrated a West Coast theatrical tour to bring the feature before the public.  Trey Spruance (Mr. Bungle, Faith No More) wrote the original film score for the movie.  Earlier this year Spruance played to sold out crowds all along the west coast with his band, Secret Chiefs 3.  The band’s new album derives influences from the film score and Dorenfeld’s imminent film-tour will visit all the markets where Secret Chiefs 3 performed.

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