... f i n a l l y ...

after too many tries for hours and
tons of stupid error messages -
I had it.
this is final
I continue on a new blog
another blog every month -
not too bad!
you see the link on the right

mad-t-party

very nostalgic. it was the first
company I started in duesseldorf -
germany - in 1985.
we were 4 very crazy artists, like
the mad tea party in ALICE IN
WONDERLAND...
you probably know 2 other members -
uli meyer and harald siepermann.

favourite

it must have been in 2000 when they asked me to
come up with some ideas for THE LITTLE MATCHGIRL.
that hans christian andersen story was always one of my
favourites. so I spend some time in intensive research
about st.petersburg, the architecture, the costumes of
the mid-nineteenth century, and the russian painters from
that era. someone else took over the art direction,
and the character design went into v e r y different
directions. it's not my favourite story anymore.

london 1992

during my time at AMBLIMATION in london we organized
life drawing classes once a week. and of course who
was the best instructor you could imagine -
JOHN WATKISS. I knew john already for many years.
what an artist. probably in my oppinion the best
drawing artist around today. he spent the time
and gave nearly everybody some very detailed
corrections. I learned so much.
later I was very happy that john started to work
at disney in L.A. I am sure most of you have seen
some of his unbelieveable artwork for TARZAN.
he did maybe 100 huge paintings in panavision format.
of course nothing was used, the paintings are hanging
now in some executive offices - they are so nice
and B I G ...

simon wells did a caricature of me reading
the wonderful script for the just so stories.

joe grant 1998

joe gave me color xeroxes of these pictures
in 1998. burny mathinson did them. the two
of them shared an office next door to mine.
burny had bought a huge agfa scanner and the
biggest epson printer on the market at that
time. these two guys had so much fun with
their computer and all that new equipment.
they were doing all their presentations for
new projects nicely edited, printed and bound.
amazing. I had just got my own mac and had
no idea what to do with it...

dinosaur lunch

during the eighties I had a chance to attend
2 of the so called 'dinosaur lunches'. some
of the disney old-timers met in a restaurant
in toluca lake, as far as I remember it was
'alphonse's'. it was a great honour, you could
only join if you knew one of the participants.
andreas deja arranged that. I never forget
that, because I had a chance to meet one of
my biggest idols, KEN ANDERSON. in the photo
on the right. on the front-left is COLIN CAMPBELL,
one of the top disney layout artists. maybe
someone can help me to identify the other
attendees. sorry, I forgot over the years...

MARCELO VIGNALI sent me the following letter -

...I used to attend the Dinosaur lunch too. As a
matter of fact, I think I saw you there on a few
occasions along with Andreas Deja. Anyway, a
friend of mine got me in and I went for six months
or more. Maybe it was closer to a year .. anyway,
I can name the gentlemen for you.

The gentleman sitting next to Colin Campbell is
Bill Anderson. "The Disney Legend Bill Anderson."
You can IMDB his name to pull up his film credits.
If I'm not mistaken, he did Old Yeller and
20,000 Leagues Under The Sea. The other gentleman
seated next to him is Clem Hall ... I'm not exactly
sure if he worked on the Disney animated films, but
I know he was a professional illustrator before
coming to Disney. He and Colin had giant mural like
oil paintings on display at EPCOT's American Adventure.
Clem also had his own illustration company during
the 60s where he did a lot of the auto ads for GM.
I would imagine he came in for EPCOT. And the other
gentleman is Ren Wicks ... he was 82 in that picture
if you can believe it! He looked and acted like a man
in his late sixties. He was also an illustrator, and
perhaps the best illustrator Disney ever got their
hands on. He did work for Colliers and Saturday Evening Post
during the golden age of illustration. Around the time
the picture was taken, he was not only working, he had just
completed an illustration for a postage stamp for the
US government and was bragging about it. He was a lot of fun,
sharp as a tack, and very friendly.
Ren was the comedian of the group.
marcelo vignali

inbetween

...something different

...testing...

..curious if it still works -