Pikkukala Taps Sardinha em Lata, Atom Art for ‘Saari 2,’ ‘Taste Buddies’ (EXCLUSIVE)

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Portugal’s Sardinha em Lata and Latvia’s Atom Art have boarded two new projects – “Saari 2” and “Taste Buddies” respectively – at Cartoon Forum, the biggest European animation event devoted to TV series.

Both series are lead-produced by Helsinki and Barcelona-based Pikkukala (“Royals Next Door,” “The Stinky Dog”), run by Pablo Jordi. “Saari 2” marks a new installment of the first series produced by Pikkukala. It was sold to more than 20 territories and already counted Sardinha em Lata (“Alice’s Diary,” Nuno Beato’s feature “My Grandfather Used to Say He Saw Demons”) as the associate animation studio. A preschool series, “Saari 2” follows the adventures and world discovery of an octopus, a lady owl, a small girl and a bohemian bird on the Saari island over 52 episodes.

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“‘Saari’ is a magic universe full of nature, music, and positive values that has delighted children all around the world,” Diogo Carvalho of Sardinha em Lata told Variety. “As a co-producer, we are very excited to work with Pikkukala in bringing this new season to the new generations of kids.”

Via this year’s Portugal spotlight, Sardinha presented two additional projects at Cartoon Forum. “Pete & Berns,” an adults-focused three minute show, and another project with Pikkukala: “The Saskatoons,” an eleven-minute adventure series for children.

Pikkukala has also signed a partnership deal for “Taste Buddies” with Atom Art, based in Riga. The project is a live action/2D animation hybrid, backed by support from pubcasters YLE (Finland) and TVC (Catalonia). An animated adventure for toddlers on taste and food discovery, it was presented at the 2020 Cartoon Forum. “We loved the project’s imaginative qualities and are really looking forward to working on it,” said Sabine Andersone at Atom Art. “‘Taste Buddies’ deals with a universal theme – food – in a playful and very singular way.”

Atom Art introduced another project this year at event in France’s Toulouse: “Hello Oscar!,” a 10-episode show on the relationship between a seven year old child and his grandmother throughout a summer.

Cartoon Forum ran Sept. 20-23 in the beautiful city of Toulouse, in the lap of the Pyrenees in southwest of France.

The Saskatoons - Credit: Credit: Pikkukala
The Saskatoons - Credit: Credit: Pikkukala

Credit: Pikkukala

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