Stephen Quay
Biography
Stephen Quay was born in 1947 in Norristown, Pennsylvania, USA. He studied illustration at the Philadelphia College of Art and later continued his education at the Royal College of Art in London, where he met his twin brother Timothy and began collaborating in animation. Together, they founded Atelier Koninck and produced their first experimental short films in the late 1970s. Throughout his career, Stephen has directed and co-directed short films, feature films, and stop-motion projects, including Nocturna Artificialia (1979), Street of Crocodiles (1986), Institute Benjamenta (1995), and The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes (2005). His work is characterized by dreamlike, detailed, and symbolic worlds, often using dolls and carefully crafted objects to create surreal and unsettling atmospheres.
Personal Details
Movies (50)
Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass
Animation (Visual Effects)
2025
The Art Teacher from Drohobycz: Bruno Schulz
Director (Directing)
2022
Ghosts and Whispers
Animation (Visual Effects)
2022
11 Preliminary Orbits Around Planet Lem
Director (Directing)
2021
VadeMecum
Director (Directing)
2021
The Doll's Breath
Director (Directing)
2019
The Music of Zdeněk Liška
as Self
2017
The 1000 Eyes of Dr Maddin
2015
Quay
as Self
2015
Unmistaken Hands: Ex Voto F.H.
Writer (Writing)
2013
Behind the Scenes with the Quay Brothers
as Self
2011
Through the Weeping Glass: On the Consolations of Life Everlasting (Limbos & Afterbreezes in the Mütter Museum)
Director (Directing)
2011
Wonderwood: Comme des garçons
Director (Directing)
2010
Maska
Director (Directing)
2010
Inside The Institute
2010
The Art of Time
2009
Kinoteka Ident
Director (Directing)
2009
The Bug Trainer
as Self - stop-motion animator
2009
Inventorium of Traces
Director of Photography (Camera)
2009
Eurydice: She, So Beloved
Director (Directing)
2007
Alice in Not So Wonderland
Director (Directing)
2007
Phantom Museums: The Short Films of the Quay Brothers
Director (Directing)
2007
The Making of "The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes"
2006
The Piano Tuner of Earthquakes
Director (Directing)
2005
Quay Brothers: The Short Films 1979-2003
Director (Directing)
2004
The Phantom Museum: Random Forays Into the Vaults of Sir Henry Wellcome's Medical Collection
as Librarian
2003
Songs for Dead Children
Director (Directing)
2003
Sonic Cinema: Sparklehorse
Director (Directing)
2001
Stille Nacht V: Dog Door
Director (Directing)
2001
The Sandman
Director (Directing)
2000
In Absentia
Director (Directing)
2000
The Brothers Quay Collection: Ten Astonishing Short Films 1984-1993
Director (Directing)
2000
Institute Benjamenta, or This Dream People Call Human Life
Director (Directing)
1995
The Summit
Director (Directing)
1995
Stille Nacht IV: Can't Go Wrong Without You
Director (Directing)
1993
Stille Nacht III: Tales from Vienna Woods
Director (Directing)
1993
Anamorphosis
Director (Directing)
1993
Stille Nacht II: Are We Still Married?
Director (Directing)
1992
The Comb
Director (Directing)
1991
The Calligrapher
Director (Directing)
1991
Ex Voto
Director (Directing)
1989
Rain Dance
Director (Directing)
1988
Rehearsals for Extinct Anatomies
Director (Directing)
1988
Stille Nacht I: Dramolet
Director (Directing)
1988
Tales of the Brothers Quay
Director (Directing)
1987
Street of Crocodiles
Director (Directing)
1986
This Unnameable Little Broom
Director (Directing)
1985
The Cabinet of Jan Švankmajer
Director (Directing)
1984
The Cabinet of Jan Švankmajer: Prague's Alchemist of Film
Director (Directing)
1984
Janáček: Intimate Excursions
Director (Directing)
1983