NEW FROM CARTER GOODRICH

 Carter Goodrich earned fame as a top character designer working on animated films such as Finding Nemo, Despicable Me, Ratatouille, Brave and Coco.  As someone noted when Goodrich was working on Prince of Egypt, he "designs characters from the inside out."  

Because the preliminary character designs for major motion pictures are often confidential and proprietary, much of the work seen by the general public has been his published magazine illustrations.  But now Goodrich has released two books of his animation characters in conjunction with an exhibition in Paris at the Daniel Maghen Gallery. One is a book of new works on the theme of the old west.  The other is a book of animation characters that he describes as "bad actors and ne'er do wells" who never made it into a final movie.                                                                                                                                                             

I get a big kick out of these drawings.

Note how Goodrich squeezes as much character into this tiny little wisp of a girl...

The crossed arms holding her books, the hunched posture of a prepubescent self-conscious girl shielding herself with her shoulders, the overbite, the spindly coltish legs, the tilt of her head, the thick glasses, goofy smile, the total absence of a chin... marvelous observations!

... as he puts into this immense wall of a character:

The characters that made their way into these two books are not the cutesy characters that might become profitable plush toys in the Disney stores.  Goodrich writes: "I have a tendency to skew a bit dark.... flawed characters are more true to me.  More interesting and relatable."

   

It's a delight to see excellent work, usually cloaked behind nondisclosure agreements with movie studios, set loose in the free air to be openly enjoyed.

ONE LOVELY DRAWING, part 78

I love this illustration of Eurystheus being frightened by creatures from Hades.  It was drawn over 3,000 years ago by a Greek artist from a workshop in Caere.  

When have you seen a better illustration of "Yikes!" ?

I love the abstract conglomeration of snapping jaws and hissing snakes.  I love that Eurystheus has pathetically tried to find safety in a large urn. His eyes are popped wide, his arms thrown up in fright (notice how sensitively the ancient artist drew that vulnerable hand, menaced by that serpent), and his mouth is curled back in fear. 

The flesh tones are as modern as Lucien Freud, Francis Bacon or Jenny Saville

3,000 years ago artists already understood the importance of design, apparently better than many professional artists working today:

The subsequent 3,000 years brought all the advantages this artist never had: vastly improved art tools,  digital or analog, delivered to his door; his global choice of art teachers accessible 24/7 through the internet; artificial light to expand his work day, air conditioning and a soft chair to enable him to work in comfort; a vast library of high resolution images to help him find inspiration in 3,000 years of precedents; regular meals to keep his belly full; glasses for when his eyes weakened and health care for when his hand began to shake. 

Yet, look at illustrations in today's publications and tell me what those 3,000 years of progress have added to the quality of our pictures.