Review by Choice Review
Despite how Parisians may still feel about "Americana," one of their own, Grand Palais curator Bruno Girveau, organized and wrote several of the essays included in this exhibition catalog. With Girveau's unprecedented access to the Disney archives and the Animation Research Library, the result is a rich visual pairing of Golden Age Disney and the European sources that served as its inspiration. The catalog shows, among other examples, how Murnau's Faust influenced Fantasia and how Casper Frederich's desolate forests are seen again in Snow White. The focus is early Disney, specifically those animated films Disney himself supervised, from Snow White through The Jungle Book, with particular attention given to Destino, the Dali-Disney collaboration. The catalog also features the "Old Nine," Disney's original troupe of illustrators; biographical sketches of these artists are included in an appendix. Better proofreading would have helped the reader fully enjoy the content without tripping over the numerous typos found in nearly every essay. However, this catalog is visually extraordinary, and readers will take great pleasure in seeing Disney's playful eye represent European aesthetic traditions in his classic works. Summing Up: Recommended. General readers; lower-division undergraduates through faculty. H. B. Bennett Yale University
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Booklist Review
What makes the Disney Studio feature films produced between 1937 and 1967, including Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Alice in Wonderland, Pinocchio, and Fantasia, "masterpieces of animation"? One pivotal factor was reliance on an ardently assembled studio library of "iconographic sources." Art historian and curator Girveau and his contributors elucidate the tremendous influence European fables, fairy tales, illustrations, and paintings had on Walt Disney and his studio artists. Works by Heinrich Kley, Pieter Bruegel, Gustave Doré, Honoré Daumier, Arthur Rackham, Lewis Carroll, and Beatrix Potter are juxtaposed with stills from the films, and, even more pleasingly, remarkably expressive preliminary drawings by such talented (and shrewdly well-trained) Disney artists as Mary Blair, Gustaf Tenggren, and Kay Nielsen. One intriguing chapter covers the short-lived collaboration between Disney and Salvador Dalí in the mid-1940s, a project resurrected by Disney's nephew Roy, in 2003, while another showcases the use of Disney characters in pop art and contemporary works, thus bringing the exchange between high and low art full circle. This gorgeous and revealing volume deepens appreciation for Disney's brilliant, imaginative, and indelible creations. Seaman, Donna.
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
