Checking In with Adult Time Animation Artist Bambi Fontaine

Get Cozy and Watch "Bambi Fontaine's Midnight Stories" on Adult Time!

French comic artist Bambi Fontaine has released the pilot episode of her erotic and very dirty animated series "Bambi Fontaine's Midnight Stories" on Adult Time and wow, it is trippy and fucking wonderful. Here's what Fontaine had to say about her art and what it's like sharing it with the world via a big ol' porn site.

Hello, Bambi! How are you doing? How are things going?
"Bonjour, ça va bien, imagination still going wild."

Congrats on the release of "Bambi Fontaine's Midnight Stories" on Adult Time! How does it feel having it out there in the world?
"It feels a bit unreal, as anything happening during summer time. But it's good to finally share it and receive all of the reactions."

What do you love most about how it all came out?
"Before the proposition [from Bobbypills Productions] of adapting my little stories in animation came, I wasn't even imagining it as a possibility. I guess it was the right moment, a question of aligned planets. I like that the concept was easy to pitch but still, the final result came as a surprise for producers. Also I received many messages asking for the release date in the last months. It's a funny sensation  when you realize you didn’t just imagine a project, now people in the real world have expectations about it."

How does it feel having your animation right next to all of this non-animated porn that is on the rest of Adult Time?

"Unexpected at a professional level, but I'm fine with it. However, I imagine the reception is going to be different from the viewer's perspective. Drawings and real life actors can't produce the exact same sensation. I didn't try to create an animation equivalent to live action porn. I'm here with an unusual proposition for a dilettante audience, hoping it will be appreciated as a special piece of candy between the viewers' usual practices."

What inspires you most in the animated stories that you tell? You have been making comics of your work for years.
"Most of the time it's a specific scene, or a picture that strikes me, and then I use the rest of the work around it to justify it in a coherent narrative. Playing with unexpected endings to tickle the audience also helps me to find the structure. Then, I embrace the attitude of Bambi, and I start a monologue that will give the final tone to the story: If I could describe the mood, I would say funny and cruel."

What do you enjoy most about using animation to tell the stories you want to tell?
"I like working on an alien object, mixing my experience in the animation industry with this weird intimate exploration. The obvious advantage of animation is that you can place your story anywhere in space and time but I also think the medium creates an aesthetic filter between the subject and the audience. In a way, I can describe things I wouldn't feel necessarily comfortable with in front of 'live action' porn. And it's also an interesting experience to create your own animated doppelgänger, a little crazier than reality."

How did this style of yours come about? What images reached out to you and made this all work?
"After my experience on the young adult oriented animated series Lastman, I came to realize that we jumped into a new era where it’s possible to create animation outside of the familial comedies. On the side, I started creating comic pages for an artistic porn magazine called Le Bateau. At first it was just an excuse to exercise myself with panels, strips and short stories, but it became obvious to me that my usual style for characters, built in a specific industry, wouldn't be a very exciting approach. In a way I reconnected with the pleasure of drawing I felt before working in animation, the feeling of lines with no production purpose and restrictions. My drawing became much more detailed, and personal. Drawing porn made me re-question my art and the approach of drawing. With these comics and few illustrations, I surprised myself, and it worked as a revelation that even changed my expectations in the other aspects of my professional work.

About the inspiration, besides the 70's aesthetic and a host of Italian and American artists, my subjects often come while walking in the street or taking the metro, or while listening to music  pictures appear, the seeds of illustrations or stories. I often feel like there's good material for narration if I can find some cruel or twisted outcome. It is also great fuel in having a specific lover in mind to sharpen your mind and pencils. Some say 'muse' for respectability, but it's clearly onanistic art material."

What else is coming up for you? What should Adult Time viewers be on the lookout for?

"Adult Time wanted to test reactions with a pilot episode, so depending on the reception we'll know if my dirty little stories will continue taking life on the platform. It's quite an unusual object, for porn and animation, so as for any unmarked trail, there's plenty of uncertainties. We're in the middle of figuring out how to make it happen."

Is there anything that you would like to say to your fans here at Fleshbot?
"We all have a personal theater of our fantasies, in search of pictures and representations. Yet we come from a history of prohibition and shaming surrounding pornography, so it's not an easy way for creation. But I hope we come to a period of time where we can finally work this topic as any other one, in new artistic and inspired ways. What I propose is quite intimate, between writing and drawing, it takes very personal shapes. So it has to be done sincerely, seriously and unapologetically. Sex, fluides and cruel stories, I hope you'll enjoy it. Don't hesitate to ask for more!"

All of the images and video here appear courtesy of Adult Time.