WeAnimate 2026-04-21 | wam#0077

Marie Jørgensen is a motion graphics artist, illustrator, and compositor who graduated from The Animation Workshop and worked in the Copenhagen animation industry for many years. Her line of Yoga Prints illustrations is quite popular online. As an ANIS board member, Marie has focused on how animation professionals can unite to improve working conditions for everyone, and her signature straight speech has galvanized a movement. In this interview, she shares her experience and her insights on the Danish animation community.

WA: You have a pretty extensive resume as a freelance animator, but you’ve been through a few transitions in recent years. Can you talk a bit about why you got into animation, and what you’ve been doing since then?

Marie Jørgensen: I think my story is really classical, in the sense that I got into animation because I had been drawing since I was a kid. When I watched Aladdin I thought the Genie was hilarious, and just knew that was what I wanted to do. So I wanted to be an animator from a very young age, and I always pursued it. I was very happy to get into The Animation Workshop. It felt like the right place for me, with the right kind of people.

I think that’s something really incredible about the industry and the people in it. The systems we have set up to do these projects are quite elaborate and quite amazing. Looking at it from the outside, it’s clear that we all know a lot more than just drawing and our craft, which is a lot in itself. But we also have to know these systems that support it, otherwise we would not get anything done.

I’ve been around the industry for so many years, and I’ve worked in big productions, TV series, feature films, and smaller projects. I’ve done visuals for musicals, artistic stuff, and also commercials… The last animation job I had was for a small production company that did explainer videos and corporate films. I was a one-woman animation department, so I did all the animated films and other people did video, editing, and sound.

WA: What motivated all that diversity in your work? Were you interested in all those different types of projects, or were you just trying to make a living?

Marie Jørgensen: Definitely both. The biggest focus career-wise and in my profession was design. Background design, and color work, were the things I focused on the most. But it wasn’t possible for me to go from production to production to production. I didn’t succeed, in that sense. And it was also super stressful for me from the very beginning to have that life where you are constantly on the lookout for work, and you don’t have any continuity. I mean, you do have continuity in experience, because you keep building your experience and your skills, both hard skills and soft skills and organizational skills. But the thing that frustrated me was that experience doesn’t translate into a better position on the next job, or in higher pay, or anything. Not just for me personally, but for a lot of people. You don’t seem to advance, and that started to bother me. In the beginning I was just like bam, bam, bam, one thing after another, and that can be really fun for a while. But then you start growing up and having a family, and it gets less fun. It starts to take a toll on your health, and mental health, and your family.

I tried it myself. At one point I was burned out with being a freelancer, juggling projects and work and expenses and everything, even before I had kids. I was so stressed, and I was doing yoga on the side, and I thought that I just needed to do manual work, something not on a screen. So I started doing yoga illustrations. I put them on Instagram and people seemed to like them. It felt super nice for my ego and my self-esteem, and it was genuinely fun, combining my interests in art and illustration and in yoga. I thought that perhaps I could create something out of these illustrations that was just mine, because I was tired of doing other people’s work.

So I made a website and a series of posters, and had a webshop and a physical shop in Copenhagen, and I did that for a number of years. It was interesting and fun, and I learned a lot and did some genuinely good work. I’m very proud of it. But my big lesson was that I could not carve out a little corner of the industry for myself that was sustainable. I got recognition online from it, and I still have the webshop up and make a few sales from it, but I could not make a sustainable living from it. In order to be a seller, and to keep the pot brewing all the time, I ended up having to do a kind of work that felt super icky to me. And I can do many different tasks in a production, but I’m not a search optimization person or a marketing expert, and I hate being on social media. So the account still exists but I’m not active on it.

And I haven’t met one person in the Danish animation industry who isn’t stressed out. Everyone I know has considered changing lanes at some point. Some people decide to go into teaching instead. I just met up with a former colleague who has gone into healthcare now and works in a laboratory. And she is so happy about it: she has a good salary, a pension, and some of her animation-related attention to detail and meticulousness is actually useful now in her medical career.

WA: A lot of people want to get a “normal job”, so that in their free time they can just explore their art and creativity, and it doesn’t have to do all that heavy lifting of fulfilling the needs of other people and also earning a living for their family.

Marie Jørgensen: That’s actually what I’m investigating right now. The film industry has had such a bad time lately, and a couple years ago the studio I was working for was about to go bankrupt, and I was let go. So I was looking for work, and I knew I wanted something steady, because freelancing is so stressful. But every time I looked at a regular animation industry job, it required you to also be an amazing editor and good at text design and also a graphic artist and to do everything, and I just felt like: “No thank you.” I mean, I could say Yes to many of those things, but I can’t say Yes to all of them. And maybe there are some people who can do everything, but I can’t, and I won’t. And the thought of sitting in front of a screen for 8+ hours every day… I just can’t any more.

These are all discussions that would be good to have with other animators. I have missed having a conversation that is more existential and philosophical, about what is it that we do, and why do we do it, and what do we get from it? I think the fact that I’ve actually stepped away from working in animation is really relevant for the work that I’m doing now with ANIS.

WA: On that subject, let’s talk more about your work with ANIS

Marie Jørgensen: I’ve been a member of ANIS and attending the yearly meetings and events since I was in school. I’ve really enjoyed participating in it, and ANIS has really been good about having people meet up and network and learn new things about the industry and each other. It’s how we often talk with each other: letting off steam, being excited about what we do, but also talking about the shit. And I have had so many discussions with my animation colleagues and friends about how we need some backup, we need to support each other.

We always have an annual assembly of ANIS, where we talk about the budget, and then we eat food and watch films, and it has always been social; more like a networking event. But a few years ago some people started asking about why we moved so quickly over the budget and the organization part of it, and is this only about food and beer and hanging out and saying nice things to each other… ? And that comment really struck me. I, too, missed having time to discuss the more difficult aspects of the industry, and how we are organized or not organized, and what are we really doing, and what do we really want?

I was in a different arts association with other creatives, and while working with them I really learned what it meant to be in an association and serve on a board. There were a lot of responsibilities, but also a lot of options and a lot of possibilities. So I started thinking, if ANIS is an association and has a budget, a board and a membership, then we can choose what we want to do with it. We can decide what it is together, as a board and as members.

So I’ve been on the board for two years, and I got on the board because I said that I want to explore the possibilities of doing more, and finding ways to make things better using ANIS resources. I want to build ANIS into a structure that can actually negotiate and create better conditions for our members. And last year we got Cathrine on board, who is also very energized and excited about it. So Claus, Cathrine, and I are the core group that are really working on how we can form a union. And the constellation of the three of us has been really good, because we have different personalities and abilities, and our strengths fit well together.

WA: What are some of the challenges ANIS is facing right now?

Marie Jørgensen: Animation people are so agreeable and like each other so much, and we don’t want to create conflict. That’s an important quality to have in this industry, because we all have to work together so closely, and we all meet each other again and again. You can’t have 15 drama queens. You just can’t make beautiful work that way. We can’t all be directors: we have to be able to take direction. But I think we have to stop confusing being nice as a  person and as a coworker, with being overly agreeable when it comes to working conditions, rights, pay, and pension. 

If companies are content to let people burn out and then replace them with new graduates, that actually doesn’t make a lot of sense. It’s a lot of work for them to recruit and set up a whole new team. They really do want experienced people. And the way that they have to set things up, where they have to apply for funding every time, and they’re constantly worried about cash flow and the projects and resources to keep the staff… that’s nobody’s fault. The studios are doing what they need to do, and I understand that: they aren’t out to take advantage of animators and deprive them of rights. They have their own interests first, as they should, and we can’t yell at them for that. But it’s about time that we look at ourselves, and realize that no one is going to hand us our rights, no one is going to give us better pay and pensions and protection. We, as creatives, have to do that work together.

I mean, we can be nice and pleasant people, and empathic and emotionally intelligent, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t say No. We have to start negotiating. And that’s totally normal: the studios do it, everyone does it.

I’m fine with saying all the controversial things, I don’t mind having difficult conversations, and I don’t mean it personally. But I really hope that we can all start having more direct discussions, not just in the bar or between friends, but also in the media, at the festivals.

WA: What do you hope for the next steps of ANIS?

Marie Jørgensen: You know, when I was younger I was very quiet, very focused on my internal world, not an outspoken person. I was shy and super scared to talk to other people and stand up and speak in public. I always thought other people were more clever and more organized, and sounded so clear and so intelligent, and I’ve always been a bit awkward. So it has been a very good lesson for me, not just in ANIS but in life, to just start saying things out loud. Start talking with your real voice, even if you don’t speak perfectly. Because it is just as important to hear from shy people. People with all kinds of experiences have opinions that really matter, and if we don’t say anything, then it’s only the very outspoken people, who are used to always taking the lead, that get to be heard. We need to hear from everyone.

I really hope that ANIS can be super clear in our communication about what we want and why we want it. We’ve done a lot of work to make this happen, and if we get a Yes from our members, it really is like pushing a button and we can transform into a union. There has been so much work going into that, but we need people to back it up and want to become members. We really can do it together.

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