I just wanted to comment, as I have been in the creative industry my entire life, ending as VP of Creative and Photography, Creative Director before that I can tell you first hand how when a concept is presented to a client, it becomes decision by committee or tyrant not much in between. I would come back from a meeting having to tell my teams “ they built a Frankenstein again” where they stitched various different concepts together to go tada…we love it…sigh.
For sure -- this is a huge problem. And it can really show in the end product. Even when people calling the shots say they love the concept, strange notes often follow before too long.
As a kid I used to rent the tres caballeros VHS over and over again from the off-brand video store we went to. This was even pre-blockbuster. I loved the visuals and the music. So neat to read about the people and projects behind these things I found so visually arresting even as a child.
Thanks for sharing this. It's an important point that films like that one, even without totally following Blair, still touched people -- despite all the inside-baseball stuff and studio politics. Elements of their vision came through and people loved them. For many artists, that would be a dream come true in itself.
Re: Mary Blair and the final look of the films on which she worked - fascinating! I always thought it would be amazing to see her work animated in some pure form, but perhaps such a thing would fall apart and lack structure and consistency. I don't know. Either way, I love her work and she was one of a kind.
Thanks, Kyle! She was absolutely something special. And there's *got* to be a way to use her art for compelling animation -- even if it isn't done in the traditional Disney style.
i discovered art books last year and came across so many different forms of concept art that it made me wonder why it didn’t end up in the movie. thank you for sharing this, you’ve reignited my love for art books all over again! also, im happy to see Pakistan on the list💛
This is great to hear! Glad you found the piece so interesting. And we're art book fans ourselves -- for more art like what we shared today, definitely check out some of the books that collect Mary Blair's work. Quite a few are out there and there's beautiful stuff in all of them.
I see a great deal of Mary Blair, in Tim Burtons Nightmare Before Christmas, also I feel Disney embraced the ‘new style’ in Fantasia, I would love to know your opinion on that film (go gently as it was my favourite animated film ever) ☺️
Haha, Fantasia definitely has modern elements in it! Disney hired a modernist animator named Oskar Fischinger to work on one section, and you can see his influence in the film. We haven't sat down to watch the whole movie end to end in a long time, though -- we're probably overdue for a rewatch to see it with fresh eyes.
Yes that was the one section I was thinking about, it’s where the different instruments are played and it shows their
sounds/waves in animation
On another note my other favourite animation is Hayao Miyazaki, produced by Studio Ghibli. Everything he did, so sad he died. There was an amazing documentary on his very last movie, they followed from the very beginning of inception to final product, everyday very intimate and enlightening documentary, a must watch, have you seen it?
Here is the name : The kingdom of dreams and madness
The documentary about Hayao Miyazaki’s last movie is called **"The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness"** (2013). Directed by Mami Sunada, it provides a behind-the-scenes look at Studio Ghibli during the production of Miyazaki's film *The Wind Rises* (2013), which at the time was considered to be his final feature before his initial retirement. The documentary also covers the work of Ghibli co-founder Isao Takahata and the broader operations at the studio during this period.
Though Miyazaki later came out of retirement to work on a new film (*How Do You Live?*), this documentary offers an intimate portrayal of his creative process and the inner workings of studio Ghibli
We're enormous Miyazaki fans over here -- thank you for the recommendation! That documentary has been on our radar but we really need to take the time to watch it. Seeing his most recent film in theaters was incredible.
Are you saying that a modernist, design-oriented style in animation, one that draws attention to its own surface and artificiality, is inherently at odds with a traditional, realism-based style, one that “disappears” in favor of the character and story?
That was definitely what many people in the industry thought back then. There was a big ideological divide over that problem, with Walt Disney and his traditionalists on one side and UPA and its followers on the other. Since then, some people have explored the gray area between those two, so the line is a bit blurrier than it used to be. But you can still see traces of it in, for example, Disney's current hesitance to embrace the stylized 3D animation that the Spider-Verse movies have made so popular.
Aug 26·edited Aug 26Liked by Animation Obsessive Staff
Great article! Blair's concept art is one the best things to come out of North American animation in the 1950s. Sadly she was in the wrong place at the wrong time; you treated this conundrum with tact and thoughtfulness. To think beyond UPA, perhaps she could've thrived in the Soyuzmultfilm system of the 60s & 70s, which gave art directors a lot of control over the aesthetic of their films. Ironically, Ivan Aksenchuk's adaptation of Cinderella from 1979 looks much closer to what Blair originally envisioned than how Disney's turned out to be (https://imgur.com/a/kx8h049). Maybe the Soviets finally struck that balance between realistic, tridimensional character animation and flat, painterly background aesthetics that Walt was chasing.
Thank you! Really kind. You make a good point about Soyuzmultfilm and Aksenchuk's work (his Little Mermaid is a bit Blair-esque as well, looking at it again). The Soviets developed really unique and strange kinds of movement to match their designs, and it's likely true that Blair's style could've fit with that approach, especially in Soyuzmultfilm's storybook-style animation.
Thank you! It was a big goal to show that complexity -- this problem had no easy answers, even though seems at first glance like it should've. Happy you enjoyed!
We're glad to share it -- even if her art didn't show up fully in the films, it can really be appreciated as standalone work. And it's continued to inspire people (including Michael Giaimo, a modern-day Disney legend). Happy you enjoyed the piece!
Mary Blair, like many significant female animators of the time, is long overlooked in animation history discourse. Even I'm ashamed to admit not knowing the gravity of her accomplishments until reading this articles. Thank you again for shedding a light on unsung voices in animation.
Such a shame the studio couldn't get the films to look like Mary's work. I wish she had started her own animation studio or knew more about UPA. In the end. It didn't matter. She was an amazing artist despite everything.
The gold standard for Disney biographies is "The Animated Man" (by Michael Barrier), but it unfortunately glosses over Mary Blair, UPA and a lot of the other things mentioned here. You might have more luck with John Canemaker's "Before the Animation Begins: The Art and Lives of Disney Inspirational Sketch Artists" and Charles Solomon's "The Disney That Never Was," which go deep into the kind of process/aesthetics/studio-politics stuff we covered today. That first one especially was a book we referenced a lot.
I just wanted to comment, as I have been in the creative industry my entire life, ending as VP of Creative and Photography, Creative Director before that I can tell you first hand how when a concept is presented to a client, it becomes decision by committee or tyrant not much in between. I would come back from a meeting having to tell my teams “ they built a Frankenstein again” where they stitched various different concepts together to go tada…we love it…sigh.
For sure -- this is a huge problem. And it can really show in the end product. Even when people calling the shots say they love the concept, strange notes often follow before too long.
Exactly 🤬
As a kid I used to rent the tres caballeros VHS over and over again from the off-brand video store we went to. This was even pre-blockbuster. I loved the visuals and the music. So neat to read about the people and projects behind these things I found so visually arresting even as a child.
Thanks for sharing this. It's an important point that films like that one, even without totally following Blair, still touched people -- despite all the inside-baseball stuff and studio politics. Elements of their vision came through and people loved them. For many artists, that would be a dream come true in itself.
Re: Mary Blair and the final look of the films on which she worked - fascinating! I always thought it would be amazing to see her work animated in some pure form, but perhaps such a thing would fall apart and lack structure and consistency. I don't know. Either way, I love her work and she was one of a kind.
Thanks, Kyle! She was absolutely something special. And there's *got* to be a way to use her art for compelling animation -- even if it isn't done in the traditional Disney style.
What a great piece! Fantastic insight.
Thanks very much!
i discovered art books last year and came across so many different forms of concept art that it made me wonder why it didn’t end up in the movie. thank you for sharing this, you’ve reignited my love for art books all over again! also, im happy to see Pakistan on the list💛
This is great to hear! Glad you found the piece so interesting. And we're art book fans ourselves -- for more art like what we shared today, definitely check out some of the books that collect Mary Blair's work. Quite a few are out there and there's beautiful stuff in all of them.
thank you! i'll check them out. would love a megalist of your art book recommendations too. just an idea :)
Thanks for the suggestion! We'll add it to the list.
I see a great deal of Mary Blair, in Tim Burtons Nightmare Before Christmas, also I feel Disney embraced the ‘new style’ in Fantasia, I would love to know your opinion on that film (go gently as it was my favourite animated film ever) ☺️
Haha, Fantasia definitely has modern elements in it! Disney hired a modernist animator named Oskar Fischinger to work on one section, and you can see his influence in the film. We haven't sat down to watch the whole movie end to end in a long time, though -- we're probably overdue for a rewatch to see it with fresh eyes.
Yes that was the one section I was thinking about, it’s where the different instruments are played and it shows their
sounds/waves in animation
On another note my other favourite animation is Hayao Miyazaki, produced by Studio Ghibli. Everything he did, so sad he died. There was an amazing documentary on his very last movie, they followed from the very beginning of inception to final product, everyday very intimate and enlightening documentary, a must watch, have you seen it?
Here is the name : The kingdom of dreams and madness
The documentary about Hayao Miyazaki’s last movie is called **"The Kingdom of Dreams and Madness"** (2013). Directed by Mami Sunada, it provides a behind-the-scenes look at Studio Ghibli during the production of Miyazaki's film *The Wind Rises* (2013), which at the time was considered to be his final feature before his initial retirement. The documentary also covers the work of Ghibli co-founder Isao Takahata and the broader operations at the studio during this period.
Though Miyazaki later came out of retirement to work on a new film (*How Do You Live?*), this documentary offers an intimate portrayal of his creative process and the inner workings of studio Ghibli
We're enormous Miyazaki fans over here -- thank you for the recommendation! That documentary has been on our radar but we really need to take the time to watch it. Seeing his most recent film in theaters was incredible.
Are you saying that a modernist, design-oriented style in animation, one that draws attention to its own surface and artificiality, is inherently at odds with a traditional, realism-based style, one that “disappears” in favor of the character and story?
That was definitely what many people in the industry thought back then. There was a big ideological divide over that problem, with Walt Disney and his traditionalists on one side and UPA and its followers on the other. Since then, some people have explored the gray area between those two, so the line is a bit blurrier than it used to be. But you can still see traces of it in, for example, Disney's current hesitance to embrace the stylized 3D animation that the Spider-Verse movies have made so popular.
Great article! Blair's concept art is one the best things to come out of North American animation in the 1950s. Sadly she was in the wrong place at the wrong time; you treated this conundrum with tact and thoughtfulness. To think beyond UPA, perhaps she could've thrived in the Soyuzmultfilm system of the 60s & 70s, which gave art directors a lot of control over the aesthetic of their films. Ironically, Ivan Aksenchuk's adaptation of Cinderella from 1979 looks much closer to what Blair originally envisioned than how Disney's turned out to be (https://imgur.com/a/kx8h049). Maybe the Soviets finally struck that balance between realistic, tridimensional character animation and flat, painterly background aesthetics that Walt was chasing.
Thank you! Really kind. You make a good point about Soyuzmultfilm and Aksenchuk's work (his Little Mermaid is a bit Blair-esque as well, looking at it again). The Soviets developed really unique and strange kinds of movement to match their designs, and it's likely true that Blair's style could've fit with that approach, especially in Soyuzmultfilm's storybook-style animation.
A fascinating and nuanced take 💕
Thank you! It was a big goal to show that complexity -- this problem had no easy answers, even though seems at first glance like it should've. Happy you enjoyed!
Mary Blair's work is beautiful and inspiring. Thank you for sharing this with us all.
We're glad to share it -- even if her art didn't show up fully in the films, it can really be appreciated as standalone work. And it's continued to inspire people (including Michael Giaimo, a modern-day Disney legend). Happy you enjoyed the piece!
Mary Blair, like many significant female animators of the time, is long overlooked in animation history discourse. Even I'm ashamed to admit not knowing the gravity of her accomplishments until reading this articles. Thank you again for shedding a light on unsung voices in animation.
Happy to share. Blair was a huge talent with a huge impact -- art today would look very different without her influence.
Fantastic read! Thank you!
Thanks for the kind words -- happy you liked it!
Such a shame the studio couldn't get the films to look like Mary's work. I wish she had started her own animation studio or knew more about UPA. In the end. It didn't matter. She was an amazing artist despite everything.
For sure. And still inspiring artists inside and outside animation today.
Can you recommend a good biography on Walt Disney that covers stuff like this? It's so fascinating.
The gold standard for Disney biographies is "The Animated Man" (by Michael Barrier), but it unfortunately glosses over Mary Blair, UPA and a lot of the other things mentioned here. You might have more luck with John Canemaker's "Before the Animation Begins: The Art and Lives of Disney Inspirational Sketch Artists" and Charles Solomon's "The Disney That Never Was," which go deep into the kind of process/aesthetics/studio-politics stuff we covered today. That first one especially was a book we referenced a lot.
About Mary Blair art:
https://www.amazon.com/Art-Flair-Mary-Blair-Appreciation/dp/1423127447/
128 pages in color, and there is a suggestion for another (smaller, 44 pgs) book
Thank you. Her work is extraordinary!
It's really stunning. And she did so much of it! We definitely recommend checking out some of the books that collect her art.
This. Was. Wonderful!
Thank you! Really appreciate it (and the very kind share). Glad you enjoyed!