Role of Tyrus Wong and influence of expressionist painter Franz Marc?
First of all, though the focus is obviously on the marvellously drawn and animated animals, I think that Chinese-American artist Tyrus Wong (born in 1910 and still alive at nearly 105!) should be praised for his wonderfully evocative watercolour and pastel backgrounds. He solved a major problem at the studio, and in an artistically very pleasing way. Disney and his animators tried to go for a previously unheard-of naturalism in the story, animals and settings, but when you fill backgrounds with hundreds of realistically drawn branches and leaves, you lose sight of the animals altogether!
So Wong, with his knowledge of 'impressionist' Chinese and Japanese art, turned out to be extremely adept at suggesting the forest by using areas of colour and vague shapes and outlines, which did not interfere with the foreground action.
See www.waltdisney.org/wong
But when I first saw Bambi (and clearly not as a child!), I was immediately struck by the fight scenes between the two stags, and some of the 'dream' sequences, and thought it looked a lot like the paintings of German expressionist artist Franz Marc (1880-1916, killed in a WW I battle), who specialized in animals.
I think it's in the bold use of colour (blue, yellow, purple, red and green deer), the suggestion of fluent movement, and the abstracted shapes with their emphasis on muscle mass.
As long as this stays online, here's the fight sequence:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=daAkMQHnuTM
or www.youtube.com/watch?v=A81hRIVU3no
Here are some links to Marc's paintings that look very similar to me:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Franz_Marc?uselang=de#/media/File:Marc-red_and_blue_horses.jpg
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Franz_Marc?uselang=de#/media/File:Franz_Marc_022.jpg
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Franz_Marc?uselang=de#/media/File:Franz_Marc_019.jpg
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Franz_Marc_Roter_Stier,_1912.jpg
http://www.kunstkopie.de/a/franz-marc/kaempfende-kuehe.html
http://www.kunstkopie.de/a/franz-marc/spielende-hunde.html
What do you think? Are these conscious sources of inspiration? Did Tyrus Wong or others at Disney know about Marc?
Dicky