german illustration 6

OLE JENSEN had in the early sixties one page in the german weekly magazine CONSTANZE. in his style he would paint portraits of some of the celebrities of that time, either movie stars or politicians. as far as I remember he was a very well known painter and a professor at one of the german art academies. unfortunately there is no information about him on the internet. I liked his unusual portrait style and his painting technique. following are the few pages I saved over the years.

© ole jensen / constanze

christoph heuer in germany sent me some more information about OLE JENSEN –
OLE JENSEN, 1924 – 1977, painter, illustrator and caricature artist, was famous for his portrait caricatures, mostly of popular politicians and movie stars. in the sixties he became well known as a ‘live-drawing-artist’ in a berlin TV evening show. the series was called – HEAD OF THE DAY or HEAD OF OUR TIMES, where he was drawing live caricatures of celebrities.

Advertisement

chinese art 5

for the weekend I thought I post some more of my favorite chinese paintings, of course – again, I don’t know the artist’s name **. need your help, in case someone out there knows. the paintings were displayed in a gallery window in one of the asian capitals, could have been beijing or hong kong, I forgot. what a beautiful combination of loose line drawing and watercolor. would work well in animation! traditional of course…

© unknown chinese artist

** the artist’s name is Fang Xiang,- thank you, james, for the information.

wood 7

fa mulan

tale as old as time

with the following ‘historic’ photographs from 1989 I want to make reference to the post about disney’s WAKING SLEEPING BEAUTY and the release of an upcoming book in august this year. the photos were done in london and L.A. during the preproduction of disney’s BEAUTY AND THE BEAST. there is my workdesk with colored storyboard pictures, the 9-picture composition was drawn by DICK PURDUM, who was supposed to direct the film together with his wife JILL. on some of the others is MEL SHAW at work on his beautiful charcoal illustrations. the book I mentioned is TALE AS OLD AS TIME: THE ART AND MAKING OF BEAUTY AND THE BEAST written by CHARLES SOLOMON. there will be a lot more pictures in the book from my collection and other sources.

© disney enterprises, inc

Nr.444

as everything else the color is perfect in disney’s 101 DALMATIANS as well. responsible for the overall look and the production design, as well as the art direction of the film was KEN ANDERSON. but he relied on one exceptional artist for the right color choices in every single sequence – WALT PEREGOY. in hundreds of small mostly abstract color sketches he defined the right color combination of the characters and the backgrounds. see below some of his work compared to the final result in the film.

© disney enterprises, inc

waking sleeping beauty 2

DON HAHN sent me a note about the opening of the DISNEY documentary WAKING SLEEPING BEAUTY on march 26th in LA, NY, San Francisco and Chicago.
he wrote –
peter schneider came to me a couple of years ago wanting to tell the story of the animation renaissance of the ‘80s and ‘90s at DISNEY.  so many books and articles had been written about this dynamic and challenging period in DISNEY history, but we felt the story hadn’t been told with candor and in a way that captured the joy and struggle of the art form. We lived it, and we wanted to tell the story from our perspective — basically put the audience in the rooms and at the tables where we sat, in as realistic a way as possible. to accomplish this, the film is crafted with archival footage, home movies, and raw caricatures most of which have never been seen before. the end result captures the perfect storm of people and circumstances that led to what John Horn of the L.A. Times proclaimed to be “the biggest comeback story in Hollywood history.”
for anyone that works in the animation industry, they will probably recognize a lot of faces in the film, and hopefully learn something new about this fascinating period of DISNEY history.  For those who worked at DISNEY during that time, this is really their story and a celebration of their work. 
We’ve just launched the trailer on Apple Trailers, so be among the first to take a peek at the film at: 
http://www.apple.com/trailers/disney/wakingsleepingbeauty/

wilhelm m.busch 4

a quote from WILHELM M.BUSCH –
my desire was to draw, I wanted to get close to reality, wanted to create new realities – and somehow until today nothing has ever changed about that ambition.
the selected illustrations below are from the classic MADAME BOVARY, written by GUSTAVE FLAUBERT, published in 1963 by bertelsmann verlag.

© wilhelm m.busch / bertelsmann verlag

chinese art 4

the beautiful artwork below is the work of a self-taught chinese artist, FU XILIN. in 1954 he was born in BEIJING, where he still lives and works. here is what someone in china wrote about his art – ‘XILIN’S paintings are fresh, simple and free from the current trend of undisciplined and neurotic paintings. they should be admired like reading poems of WANG WEI or MEN HOARAN or like listening to the violin music of PAGANINI. it is the overwhelming beauty of classicism. he is highly skilled in the control of lines and colours to achieve the harmonious atmosphere. the effects are clearly visible when he tackles the idyllic and dream-like landscape, the misty early morning and the glimmering haze.’

© fu xilin

disney illustration 1

one of my favorite disney books was and still is OUR FRIEND THE ATOM, written by HEINZ HABER and art-directed by PAUL HARTLEY. it was published paralell to the release of the film-special in 1956. in those days the illustrations, additionally printed in the MICKEY MOUSE MAGAZINE, were magical for me, for the longest time I tried to figure out the stipple-brush technique that was used in some of the illustrations. the elite of disney’s BG- and layout artists contributed their work for the book, legends like CLAUDE COATS, JOHN HENCH, FRANK ARMITAGE, COLLIN CAMPBELL, ALBERT WHITLOCK and a lot more. following is a small selection of the artwork in the book.

© disney enterprises, inc

b/w 1

© disney enterprises, inc
© amblin / universal
© bilderfabrik

multiplane camera 2

in my book – DREAM WORLDS, PRODUCTION DESIGN FOR ANIMATION – the last chapter is about the DISNEY MULTIPLANE CAMERA. I asked the disney archives ARL to help me with some official photographs and learned there were only four left. since that time three years ago I have searched everywhere on the internet, in blogs and old magazine articles for more pictures from the old days, when the disney invented camera was in use for classics like BAMBI, PETER PAN or SLEEPING BEAUTY. following are the pictures I found so far…

© disney enterprises, inc

jiri trnka 3

PARSIVAL – LOHENGRIN, written by GERHART HAUPTMANN was newly published in 1963 by the german ULLSTEIN verlag with illustrations JIRI TRNKA. they look like woodcuts, but TRNKA used a very oldfashioned positive/negative technique. I learned that unusual technique in school, – you have to scratch the white lines out of a painted black surface applied over a special prepared white first layer. in case you plan your illustration well you can place negative looking elements next to positive pen and ink drawn areas. today in photoshop it is less spectacular and much faster.

© jiri trnka / ullstein publishing

realism

GOTTFRIED HELNWEIN was born in VIENNA, austria, in 1948. after his studies at the academy of art in vienna he became a masterclass student of the ‘magic realist’ RUDOLF HAUSER. helnwein’s first hyper-realistic paintings were successful very early in numerous exhibitions. the end of the seventies he created commissioned works for the mass media, what enabled him to address a broader public outside the art-world. after some years in germany helnwein moved to ireland in 1997 where he lives and works in a castle in county tipperary. he is not only well known for his paintings, he works as a photographer and stage designer for theatre, ballet and opera as well. following a few of his novel-illustrations for the german magazine STERN in the early eighties.

© gottfried helnwein / gruner + jahr

kathrinchen

these beautiful illustrations were done by HEINZ EDELMANN for the children book KATHRINCHEN GING SPAZIEREN ( LITTLE CATHERINE WENT FOR A WALK ), written by PETER HACKS and published in 1973 by MIDDELHAUVE VERLAG COLOGNE. the characters and backgrounds look like the world in the film YELLOW SUBMARINE from 1968, designed by edelmann as well.

© heinz edelmann / middelhauve publ.

eugene galien-laloue 5

© eugene galien-laloue

battle

the 1971 russian SOYUZMULTFILM production THE BATTLE OF KERZHENETS was directed by IVAN IVANOV-VANO and YURIY NORSHTEYN, set to the musik of RIMSKY-KORSAKOV. the cut-out stop motion animation was done using elements of russian religious frescoes and paintings from the fourteenth to sixteenth century. the story is based on the legend of the invisible city of KITEZH, which disappears under the waters of a lake to escape an attack by the mongols. following are some captured scenes.

© soyuzmultfilm

wilhelm m.busch 3 b

here now the second part of WILHELM M.BUSCH’S illustrations for the circus story-collection book. BUSCH apparently loved the circus, the way it was a while ago. I still remember when I was in a circus for the first time when I was ten years old, the magical unreal atmosphere, the smells, the fantasy costumes, all the different wild animals, the dangerous stunts of the acrobats and the clowns of course. the last time years later I had the same experience during my visit to CIRCUS RONCALLI in germany. these images are burned in my memory, images I will never forget – like the sad clown playing a beautiful, melancholic melody on his rusty trumpet, the old lady riding on a white horse, big masked creatures, and clown PIC and his soap-bubbles, who I had a chance to work with on a tv show in the eighties. the drawings from this master-illustrator triggered all these memories and I am sure they do the same in some of you.

© wilhelm m.busch / heyne verlag

wilhelm m.busch 3 a

the illustrations below by WILHELM M.BUSCH are from a short story compilation THE WORLD’S BEST CIRCUS STORIES ( DIE SCHOENSTEN CIRCUS GESCHICHTEN DER WELT ) edited by UTTA DANIELLA, published in 1980 by wilhelm heyne verlag, munich. these late BUSCH illustrations were always my favorites, they look so light, so easily done with the experience of a whole life. I selected a few of the more than hundred pieces in the book. part two will follow tomorrow…

© wilhelm m.busch / heyne verlag

chinese art 3

again some more artwork of two chinese artists. and again I can’t figure out their names. it is a very unusual style I have never seen anywhere else.

vital from spain informed me that the second artist is HU YONGKAI. you can find more about him here

© unknown chinese artist / hu yongkai