A-HAA at CTN-X

This weekend, the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive will have a booth at...

CTN-X
Burbank Marriott Convention Center
November 20-22, 2009
http://www.ctnanimationexpo.com/

CTN-X=Talent Driven. For professional animators, studio executives and art students, it takes place at the Burbank Marriott Convention Center with ample discounted parking, conveniently located near the Burbank Airport and Amtrak Station.

At the booth we will have the entire Archive Database available to browse. Stop by and say hello.
.

Stumble It!

FREE EBOOK: Zim's Cartoons and Caricatures Part 11 of 20

Before we get to today's post, a couple of announcements... We will begin deleting the earlier posts in this series next week, so if you haven't downloaded them yet, do it now. Also, we have only 15 sets of the Zim Cartooning Course left. We may not be able to get more copies before Christmas, so if you hope to have them under your tree, order now. Thanks!

This is the eleventh of twenty posts where we plan to post a complete set of high resolution scans of Zim's Cartoons & Caricatures, or Making The World Laugh (1910). These 100 pages are packed with great cartoons, helpful drawing tips, technical information and business advice for the aspiring cartoonist. Most importantly, Zim passes along his unique philosophy of life, and offers a shining example of how an artistic career as a caricaturist can be incorporated into a person's lifestyle. At the time this book was written, Zim had thirty years of experience under his belt, and had attained the highest level in his field. For more information, see the Zim's Cartoons & Caricatures page.

Every week, we will post five more pages, but they will be deleted from our server after 30 days, so download them while you can. To save the images to your hard drive, right click on the image (or CONTROL click if you are using a Mac) and select "SAVE IMAGE AS". To see all of the currently available pages, see the ZIMEBOOK Tag.





If you haven't downloaded previous entries, please do so immediately. I am going to start expiring links to earlier posts soon. Check back next week for more pages from this rare book.


If you enjoy this ebook and would like to see more, consider purchasing Zim's Correspondence School of Cartooning, Comic Art & Caricature, a complete course in cartooning available in two volumes. The books are beautifully printed and include more than 700 pages with nearly 1,000 B&W illustrations and 22 hand-tipped color plates. Proceeds from the sale of this course goes to support the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive. For more information, see the Zim Online Exhibit page.
.

Stumble It!

Comics: Trog's Rufus and Flook

Today, I'm posting a complete story by a comic strip artist whose name won't be familiar to you unless you grew up in England in the 50s and 60s... he went by the name of "Trog". The nickname, short for "Troglodyte", came from his days hunkered down in air raid shelters during WW2. His real name is Wally Fawkes, and he's one of those artists who has had two equally noteworthy careers- one as a cartoonist and the other as a Jazz musician.

Fawkes played clarinet in Humphrey Lyttleton's jazz band in the 40s and 50s, and was one of the finest Jazz musicians in Britain. But in 1956, he launched a simultaneous career as a cartoonist, which brought him even more fame. “To cartoonists, I was always the one who played jazz. To musicians, I was always the one who drew cartoons.” he once said. But his talent for capturing personality through caricature was his strongest suit. Fellow artist, Nicholas Garland wrote of his political cartoons, "Very few artists can see a likeness the way he can, and catch it so completely. He doesn't develop a hieroglyph for each politician and then simply reach for it each time it is needed. Every Trog caricature is carefully recrafted." You can see this in the story that follows in this post. Trog doesn't simply copy the caricatured heads from panel to panel. He's able to convey the essence of the caricature from a different angle in almost every frame.


At age 21, Fawkes entered an art contest that was being judged by the Daily Mail cartoonist, Leslie Illingworth. Illingworth was impressed with Fawkes' work and got the young artist a job at the Daily Mail. Using his nickname, Trog, Fawkes created a comic strip about an imaginary furry creature named "Flook". It became an instant hit and Trog became the toast of the town. At a reception soon after its launch the Daily Mail's owner, Lady Rothermere asked him, "How is your lovely little furry thing?" Trog replied, "Fine thank you. How is yours?" The cartoonist had to beat a quick retreat after that quip, but admitted that he couldn't help himself when presented with such a perfect setup.


Trog worked with several writers on the strip over the years- Compton Mackenzie, George Melly and Humphrey Lyttleton among others- and the direction of the strip evolved from a light hearted fantasy for children to pointed political humor similar to Walt Kelly's Pogo. But the stories aren't the reason that Rufus and Flook are so interesting today- it's the unique drawings.


When I first ran across this strip, I admit that I really didn't know what to think about it. The drawings of the main character Flook were dumbfoundingly ignorant. But the incidental characters were wonderfully observed, sharp caricatures of British society at the time. And the backgrounds often included perfectly thought out compositions with impeccable architectural perspective and beautiful stylization of folliage. At first, this sharp contrast between ignorance and genius can be jarring. But after reading a while, the direct, simplistic looseness of the main characters and the planned and observed structure of the rest of the drawings don't clash because Trog's stylish sense of fun makes it all work.

Rufus and Flook continued in the Daily Mail for 40 years, until Trog's jabs at Margaret Thatcher earned him the scorn of the paper's conservative editorial staff. He never took censorship personally though. In 1977, when one of Trog's political cartoons of Cyril Smith was rejected, and he simply shrugged his shoulders and said, "It's their paper." After leaving the Daily Mail,Trog moved on to the Mirror and the Sunday Telegraph until his failing eyesight forced him to retire from his art career in 2005 and pick up the clarinet again.

Personally, I think it's a shame Fawkes isn't better known in the US. Perhaps the softspoken, rambling British tone of the stories and the topical nature of the satire doesn't come across at all any more, but those drawings- wow!


This story from early in the strip's run comes from an extremely rare paperback compilation, titled simply Flook...

RUFUS & FLOOK in
ROMAN' IN THE GLOAMIN'


























Let me know if you would like to see more by Trog in the comments.

Thanks
Stephen Worth
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive
.

Stumble It!

Illustration: Felix Lorioux's Le Buffon des Enfants

This post is just the tip of the iceberg... see reason number 3 on our The Top Ten Reasons To Support The A-HAA for links to more great posts about children's book illustrators.


Here's another post about an artist you've never heard of before, but you'll never forget once you look at his work! My pal Tony "Superslice" Mora gave me this book as a birthday gift. It's a real treasure.

Felix Lorioux was one of France's best loved artists, but he was a humble, quiet man who did little to promote himself beyond his home country. He was born in 1872 and began as a fashion designer. But his childlike sense of wonder led him to a career as a children's book illustrator. Walt Disney was impressed with his abilities and hired him to illustrate books for the French market based on Mickey Mouse and the Silly Symphonies. It has been said that a Lorioux illustration of a goose in a sailor suit may have even been the inspiration for Donald Duck. Around 1934, Disney revoked the contract and brought the work in house. Presumably, Walt felt that Lorioux's illustrations were "off model" and wanted to standardize the look of the books featuring his characters. Ultimately, it was Disney's loss, not Lorioux's.


Lorioux went on to illustrate definitive editions of Perrault's Fairy Tales, Don Quixote, the Fables of La Fontaine and Robinson Crusoe. However, he was most at home painting delicate watercolors of the birds, flowers and insects in his garden. He imagined fantastic worlds populated by these little creatures. This book, "Le Buffon des Enfants: Les Insectes de Chez Nous" is one of his greatest works. Tony was fortunate enough to stumble across a deluxe edition from 1946 that was limited to only 2000 copies. The print quality is astounding. Lorioux's books are rarely seen in the United States. If there are any readers of this blog in France, we would appreciate information on this amazing artist, and scans of any of his work in your collection.

SELECTED ILLUSTRATIONS FROM
LE BUFFON DES ENFANTS













I don't have room on the blog to reproduce this entire book, but check out the way Lorioux incorporates his watercolors into the text of the book...


Over the years, many animated cartoons have been set in the tiny world of insects... Fleischer's Mr. Bug Goes To Town and Disney's "Woodland Cafe" and "The Grasshopper and the Ants" spring immediately to mind. There have been several recent CGI features in this sort of setting as well, and none of them comes anywhere close to the appeal and striking uniqueness of Lorioux's paintings (or those of Feodor Rojankovsky). Animation is a visual medium. Design matters.

If you found this to be useful, see also... Rojankovsky's Frog Went A-Courtin' / Tibor Gergely's A Day In The Jungle, Gustaf Tenggren's The Little Trapper, Uncle Remus Stories Part One and Part Two, Little Verses Part One, Part Two and The New Golden Song Book Part One, Part Two and Part Three, and Huckleberry Hound Builds A House.

Thanks
Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive

Stumble It!