Donyo Donev

Donyo Petrov Donev (; 27 June 192928 November 2007) was a Bulgarian animator, director, art director, comics artist and cartoonist. He is best known as the "father of The Three Fools" – an animated humorous sequence whose short episodes were continuously released during the 1970s and 1980s. His biting satirical caricatures were published in most of the Bulgarian newspapers.

Donev's works are characterized with simplified lines, the plasticity of the motion, and vivid expressiveness. He was the first to use a deformed manner of speaking and interjections as a sound image of a second plan, accompanied with the sounds of drums and bagpipes.

Biography and career Donyo Donev was born on 27 June 1929 in Berkovitsa, a small town in the northwest part of Bulgaria. He enrolled at the National Academy of Art in Sofia, where he studied graphic art in 1949–1954 under the eminent Bulgarian artist Ilia Beshkov. Some of his other notable works are Happy End (1969), Clever Village (1972), De Facto (1973) and Causa Perduta (1977). There are also numerous awards he received for his other animated films through the years.

In the 1990s Donev was an editor-in-chief of the satirical paper named after his famous animated characters The Three Fools. He was also an editor in "Fras" (bang!) – a magazine for humour and fun. As a cartoonist he constantly took part in exhibitions in Bulgaria and abroad.

Donev has been a professor at the National Academy for Theatre and Film Arts for years, where he taught directing of animation. 1989 – Silver Dragon for Wolf's Suite – Cracow Film Festival