Chris (Simpsons artist) on kissing, art, life and controlling Joe Lycett by the hair (like Ratatouille)

It’s Nice That: Chris, your work has famously relied on a specific kind of physical distortion (extra fingers, elongated necks, bizarre intimacy). How does that translate into fully-animated motion for the first time?

Chris (Simpsons artist) (CSA): Animation let me explore the awkwardness between movements like the pause before a kiss or a blink that lasts a little bit too long or a hand that doesn’t quite know where it should rest and when I draw pictures all of these things are frozen but in animation they can breathe which I really like.

INT: Your MS-paint style emerged at a time when lo-fi aesthetics were put into high-effort projects (for example, the ‘badly drawn’ trend, The Big Lez Show, etc). Why do you think, even after a decade, that your illustration style continues to be hilarious and relatable?

CSA: I think the way that I draw looks quite simple which I really like because when something looks perfect and polished people often ignore it but when something looks a little bit fragile or imperfect then in a way they can see themselves in it and I have never ever chased a trend and I have only ever drawn the only way that felt naturally to me at the time and I just never stopped so I suppose after a while that stops becoming lo-fi and just becomes who I am.

INT: There was always some kind of story in your illustrations: often short, Times New Roman captions that touch on mundane-surrealist themes. How do you expand that shower-thoughts, fever dream logic into animated films that are five or more minutes long?

CSA: I enjoy writing just as much as I enjoy drawing and I actually might like writing a bit more because you can say loads when you write and people always say a picture says a thousand words but that is a lie because a picture says no words because I saw the Mona Lisa in an art gallery once and she didn’t say anything she just stared at me for ages and when we started making the films it wasn’t about stretching one joke over five minutes it was about looking for what was underneath the joke like in the kissing episode it becomes about vulnerability and in the phone addiction episode it becomes a story about loneliness and longing and in the death episode it becomes a story about holding someones hand for the last time because most of all of us will hold that hand or have ours held and that is a beautifully sad thing that connects us all.

INT: Mike, you’ve worked on projects like The Future of Everything which have a very specific Australian chaotic energy. How does that mesh with Chris’ more deadpan British surrealism?

Mike Greaney (MG): Chris’ comedic sensibilities are so singular: this combination of deadpan British humour, internet surrealism and gentle naiveté. I feel like this process was less one of getting on board with a particular cultural style, and more about trying to mind meld with Chris, who has such a particular voice that I wanted to honour.

INT: How was it working with Joe Lycett as the narrator of these shorts? I didn’t know there was a way to give a voice to the dryness of your sense of humour, but here we are.

CSA: I loved working with Joe Lycett and when we were doing the voice recordings for I’m glad I know that now thank you I actually sat on Joe Lycett’s head and I controlled him like the rat (whose name is called Ratthew from the film Ratatouille) did to the chef but instead of making him cook pasta I massaged Joe’s throat with my fingers to make him talk and even though I strangled him by accident and he had to spend four nights in St Mary’s Hospital and he nearly died twice I am still so proud of him and I hope that he will consider working with me again once he has learned to walk and talk again because he did a really good job at guiding the story with his voice in a beautiful way that is both warm and dry at the same time and it felt like it had always belonged there.

INT: That’s nice.

INT: Both of your works often balance genuine sweetness (how to kiss, how to navigate phone addiction, how to deal with death) with body horror. How do you decide when to lean into the “ick” factor versus the heart of the story?

MG: Comedy, sentimentality and horror are all sides of the same dice. They’re extreme emotional reactions that shock you out of autopilot and make you think differently about the world around you and what you’re experiencing.

When I was a kid, an old guy had a heart attack and collapsed at a church function my family was attending. So we’re waiting for the ambulance to arrive and this guy’s wife is freaking out and they’re giving him CPR. And all the while the unconscious dude was farting like crazy. Just like super loud, cartoon style farts that everyone was doing their best to ignore. My little brother found it too funny and my mum had to take him out of the room.

Life’s always like that, never 100 per cent comedy or 100 per cent tragedy, it’s always a mixture of body horror and sweetness.

CSA Bodies are strange and love is strange and growing old is strange and we leak and tremble and hold hands through it all even if it makes us feel uncomfortable because that is life and even amongst the horror of life there is always a sweetness to be found inside of it and that is what I like to focus on because it is a good reminder that we are all human and humans are a bit strange and a bit horrible and a bit disgusting but when you find just the right spot in between the horror of life you will often find the sweetness that is hidden amongst it and that is quite a nice place to stand still for a moment and have a quiet look around.