Exhibit Preview – “Inspiring Walt Disney: The Animation of French Decorative Arts” Arrives at the Huntington Library

After successful runs at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Wallace Collection in London, the “Inspiring Walt Disney: The Animation of French Decorative Arts” exhibit has arrived at the beautiful Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens in San Marino, just south of Pasadena in Southern California.

This fascinating, eye-opening exhibit explores the early inspirations behind Disney Studios’ creations, “examining Walt Disney’s fascination with European art and the use of French motifs in Disney films and theme parks.” This morning I had the wonderful opportunity to visit the Huntington for a media preview of “Inspiring Walt Disney,” and I definitely walked away having learned much more about what inspired Walt during the early days of feature animation, through his work in developing Disneyland, and how animators continued that tradition into the “Disney Renaissance” decades after his passing.

“We’re thrilled that [the arrival of this exhibit] lines up with the 100th anniversary of the incorporation of Disney [as a company],” said Christina Nielsen, the Director of the Huntington Art Museum. “We know that French decorative arts in the hands of incredibly talented Disney artists, inkers, and animators have changed the lives of us all. This [exhibit] is incredible for showing the way that historic works of art [that are] several hundred years old– that were incredibly vivid and lavish in their own lifetime– in the hands of Disney Studios, became very lifelike once again. On the silver screen, this Rococo aesthetic and centuries-old French fairy tales burrowed deep into our individual and collective psyches. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the Walt Disney Animation Research Library, the Walt Disney Archives, Walt Disney Imagineering, and the Walt Disney Family Museum.”

“[For] those of us who are Southern Californians, Disney is all around us, so I feel like this [exhibit] here in this place is really special and important– that we’re doing it for this audience that’s built-in,” said Melinda McCurdy, the exhibition’s Venue Curator at the Huntington. “My hope is that the interest that people living in Southern California– and everywhere, basically– have in Disney will bring them to the Huntington. If those people come away with a newfound appreciation of historical decorative arts, then this project has done its job. This is a doorway in. It’s a way to bring two very different art forms together, but have them speak to each other. It’s so special to be able to see our objects– which are on view in our galleries normally– in a whole new context, telling a whole new story.”

“This is a kind of homecoming; we’re in Disney country,” said Wolf Burchard, Associate Curator of Decorative Arts for Metropolitan Museum of Art, who created this exhibit for its initial run in New York. “This is really very special. I’ve always had a fascination for Disney hand-drawn animation, particularly the craftsmanship and the technology that you’ll see in the [exhibit]. But what really struck me, in bigger terms, is really a global phenomenon. Everybody can relate to Disney in one form or another, and will have a reaction– either positive or negative.”

“This exhibition brings together two forms of artistic expression that may at first seem worlds apart,” continued Burchard. “On one hand, you have Disney hand-drawn animation made for a large, international audience, and then [on] the other you have Rococo decorative works of art that are made for a small European elite. Yet when you bring those two worlds together, you will find that there are very many areas of overlap– in their artistic intuition, in their workshop practices, in the advances they each pushed in design and technology. And neither of those two forms of artistic expression can be put into a particular category.”

“People ask, ‘Is animation art?’ And decorative arts are kind of the underdog of [among] the forms of traditional art– they’re not architecture, they’re not painting, they’re not sculpture. That can also be said of Walt Disney himself: he didn’t fall into a particular category, and people don’t know what to make of him. Is he an artist? Is he an entertainer? Is he an entrepreneur? Disney himself had no aspiration to be seen either as an artist or an intellectual– he just wanted to do the things he wanted to do. What we’re looking at here is really a journey of creativity, both in the 18th century and in the 20th century.”

“This exhibition isn’t about Walt Disney, the man. This is not going to summarize his whole professional trajectory– that has been done elsewhere [at the] Walt Disney Family Museum in San Francisco– we’re looking at a very particular slice of his and his studio’s work. Think of, for instance, Picasso’s blue period. We’re really focused on one particular aspect, and that is bringing to life what is inanimate, and Disney’s relationship with France.”

Also on display in the “Inspiring Walt Disney” exhibit– and sure to be of particular interest to Laughing Place readers– is the original 1953 Herb Ryman bird’s-eye concept drawing of Disneyland, which was used to pitch the theme park’s concept to investors.

“Inspiring Walt Disney: The Animation of French Decorative Arts” runs from tomorrow (Saturday, December 10th) through Monday, March 27th at the Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens. For additional information and to plan your visit, be sure to use the Huntington’s official website. Also, an exclusive D23 Gold Member event will celebrate the exhibit’s launch on this coming Monday, December 12th.