Media: Arthur Rackham's Grimm's Fairy Tales

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Arthur Rackham was one of the most influential illustrators who ever lived. If you aren't familiar with his work, see Bud Plant's biography. These scans are from a first edition of Grimm's Fairy Tales from 1909. This book is packed with amazing color plates and ink sketches.

Along with Edmund Dulac, (see our previous postings of his work... Poe's Poetical Works, H. C. Andersen Stories, and Tanglewood Tales) Rackham was one of the most popular book illustrators of the early 20th century.

Walt Disney admired Rackham's watercolor and pen & ink style, and instructed Gustaf Tenggren (see our previous postings of his work... Small Fry and the Winged Horse, Three Early Tenggren Books, Grimm's Fairy Tales, and The Little Trapper) to work with Claude Coates and Sam Armstrong to adapt it for use in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. In animation backgrounds however, the sinewy Rackham line was overly busy, distracting from the characters; so Tenggren evolved towards the more dimensional painting style in Pinocchio, which set the standard for Disney cartoons throughout the 1940s.






























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Thanks
Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive

9.30.08
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