Over at my very own Harry Go Round, Kip Williams is reporting on Michael Paulus’s Skeletal Systems, a series of drawings of…well, of the skeletons of cartoon characters we know and love, including everyone from Baby Huey to the Shmoo.
If you’re in Portland (Oregon, that is) you can see these in person at a coffee shop this month. If you’re anywhere else, stop by the online gallery and prepare to spend some time being startled and fascinated.
There are bears that have been licensed, such as Yogi, Pooh, Paddington, the Care Bears, and other lovable ursines who I’m forgetting right now. And then there’s Licensable Bear(tm).
Spotted this actual ad on Variety.com yesterday. A long shot, but hell… If I were an Academy member I’d vote for him!
You are invited!The International Animated Film Society, ASIFA-Hollywood, will be holding its annual animated Xmas Party at the new ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Center in Burbank on Friday December 17th. Refreshments will be served. All are welcome. Don’t be afraid, it’s free!This will also be the first public viewing of our new headquarters in Burbank. Before we move our archives, library and offices into the space, while it’s still empty, it’s a perfect place for a Holiday Season bash!Live music! Food! Cartoons! Fun!
Join us!December 17th, 2004 at 7:30pm
The New ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Center
2114 Burbank Blvd.
Burbank (4 blocks east of Buena Vista on the South side of the street)
We gotta wait eight months longer for Pixar’s deal with Disney to end… CARS has been pushed back to summer 2006.
No, not Woody Woodpecker, but Woody Allen: This New Yorker send-up of the Ovitz trial testimony reveals stuff we didn’t know about Mickey, Donald, Goofy, and even Daffy and Petunia. I found more yuks in this piece than the last decade’s worth of Allen films. (Link via Mark Evanier and Andrew Leal.)
Asifa Hollywood announced it’s nominees for it’s annual Annie Awards today. The list is too long to post here but key nominees are:Best Animated Feature
Ghost In The Shell 2: Innocence
The Incredibles
Shrek 2
The SpongeBob SquarePants MovieBest Home Entertainment Production
The Lion King 1 1/2 – DisneyToon Studios
Mickey, Donald & Goofy “The Three Musketeers” – DisneyToon Studios
Scooby-Doo and the Loch Ness Monster – Warner Bros. AnimationBest Animated Short Subject
Agricultural Report – Barley Films
It’s The Cat – Mark Kausler
Lorenzo – Walt Disney Pictures
Rockfish – Blur Studio
Ryan – Nat’l Film Board of CanadaBest Animated Television Production
Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends – Cartoon Network Studios
My Life As A Teenage – Frederator/Nickelodeon
SpongeBob SquarePants – Nickelodeon
Star Wars: Clone Wars – Cartoon Network Studios
The Batman – Warner Bros. AnimationThe winners are announced at the Annie Awards ceremony on January 30th, at the Alex Theatre in Glendale. The complete list of nominees is posted on Asifa-Hollywood’s website.
Carl Stalling’s business card, from his days at the Walt Disney studio!If you’ve got over $900 to spare… It’s yours! Check it out on ebay.(Thanks to Daniel Goldmark for the link)
Amid reminds me that some time ago, a reader of his Animation Blast site sent him some images from an eBay postcard auction involving a steakhouse with an impressive mural based on UPA’s ROOTY TOOT TOOT. Whether any actual animators were involved in the creation of the mural, we’re not sure–but judging from the pictures, it wouldn’t be surprising.
Anyone know where this restaurant was/is? I’m assuming the mural is no longer with us, but I’d love to be proven wrong. (A Google search for “Johnny’s Prime Steaks” returns–*sniff*–no items.)
Someone in France posted an uber-cool gallery of Little Golden Book pages, featuring art by J.P. Miller, Mel Crawford and others, including the above Huck Hound story by Norman McGary and Hawley Pratt.(via Boing Boing)
I hate to see a whole day go by without a post here. Amid and I are are busy on separate book projects this month. My postings will be a little less than normal this month – and this week in particular, as I battle several tight deadlines. Today I spent the whole day gathering all the images together for my Animated Features guide. The Peter Pan ad above has no particular signifigance to anything – just something I came across today, and I thought it was a fun thing to post.Have a good weekend.
Our Lost Hollywood Animator Mural series continues with this beauty (above) painted by Paul Julian.Reader Terry Guy passes along this picture and information:
The recent Cartoon Brew posts about murals reminded me of this one, which is not so cartoony, but is the work of Warner Brothers cartoons background painter/Roadrunner voice artist Paul Julian.It may be seen in the Post Office at 202 E. Commonwealth Avenue in Fullerton, CA, close by the Amtrak station. When I was there about a year ago (when I took the accompanying picture), a document was posted on the wall below the mural (on the other side of the door from the Wanted poster), with the following text:INFORMATION ON THE POST OFFICE MURAL
The noted California painter Paul Julian painted the large mural on display in the old Fullerton post office. Julian was born in 1914 in Santa Barbara, California. He trained with Millard Sheets and Lawrence T. Murphy at the Chouinard Art Insititute. The mural was commissioned by the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The WPA program began in 1933 at the suggestion of George Biddle, an artist who had studied with Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. Biddle persuaded President Franklin Roosevelt to institute a program similar to one the Mexican government created, to decorate government buildings. This effort sparked an artistic revolution. The program provided needy artists with work and money. This also offered artists a range of creative options, from small paintings to large murals.
This mural depicts life in Fullerton in the mid-thirties. Fullerton High students picking Valencia oranges, oil derricks, and the Fullerton airport. The artistic license taken by Paul Julian has created some controversy because the ladder shown, a three-legged type, is not the right type for picking oranges, and oranges were never packed in boxes in the field. They would have been placed into a large over the shoulder bag while being picked and then carried to the boxes, and commingled with the others.The idea that artistic license over orange crates and ladders is controversial seems incongruous today, when we know that the term “controversy” really should be reserved for issues of great magnitude, such as Janet Jackson’s Superbowl “wardrobe malfunction”. On the other hand, this was Fullerton in the thirties, and they took their oranges seriously.
This just in: There’s been a rash of kidnappings of the giant inflatable SpongeBob Squarepants figures that have been placed atop Burger King outlets to promote the genial sea creature’s movie. Some of the balloons have even shown up on eBay.
Personally, if I were to pilfer any figure from a fast-food joint (which I wouldn’t), it would be a Big Boy or possibly a Jollibee…but those guys aren’t cartoon characters.
I’ve come across several of these in my travels – and have set up a dedicated webpage for them (see the complete four panel strip of the above, here). If anyone has any more to share, or can shed further light on them… let me know.
