Look Closer Recap: Our Lady of Flair

For our April Look Closer presentations, The Walt Disney Family Museum Interpreters had the pleasure of focusing on four related artifacts, which together comprise the display devoted to Mary Blair. Located under our lower level stairwell, this display has become a popular stopping point for visitors, from curious newcomers to longtime fans of the beloved Disney Legend, Animator, and Imagineer. Interestingly, designers of the Museum originally didn’t allow for a space dedicated strictly to Mary Blair memorabilia; but when the artifacts became available, our Collections department cleverly found a special way to share them with our visitors.

The item in the display that first catches your eye is the color-splattered paint stand that was in Mary’s workspace at WED Enterprises (now Walt Disney Imagineering). The stand is a Kem Weber design from 1939 and holds artist supplies and implements used by Blair on various projects. Resting alongside the many paint trays and brushes is a pair of Mary’s eyeglasses, suitably fashionable for a woman known for her sense of style.

©DisneyHanging behind the paint stand is a large, particularly striking black and white photograph of Mary, taken by her husband, artist Lee Blair, in the early 1960s. The photo shows Mary at work in her home studio in Great Neck, Long Island, where she is surrounded by concept art created for “it’s a small world,” and illustrations for various advertising campaigns from the 1950s and 1960s.

Also featured in the “Our Lady of Flair Shrine” as Michael Labrie, Director of Collections, lovingly calls the Mary Blair display, is a framed pastel portrait of Blair drawn and signed by fellow artist, Jack Miller, during the 1941 South American "Good Neighbor" Tour. The peg holes running down the left side of the portrait attest to the fact that Jack sketched Mary on animation paper while at work on assignment in South America.

The most unusual item in the Mary Blair display is arguably the blue hard hat decorated with faux jewels, silver wire, and fabric flowers. This hat was presented to Blair by her fellow artists at WED during the building of the Disneyland model for "it’s a small world." The hat is a playful reminder of both the fondness and admiration that the Disney crew had for Mary, and the fact that "it’s a small world" was a new pinnacle in her career.

Most of the items in the lower level display were gifts to the Walt Disney Family Foundation from Mary Blair’s nieces, Jeanne Chamberlain and Maggie Richardson. It’s especially fitting that all of these artifacts are now available for the public to enjoy in an area of the Museum where even the design of the colorful terrazzo floor was inspired by work from one of Walt Disney’s favorite and most influential artists.

Mary Beth Culler

Museum Interpreter at The Walt Disney Family Museum

The Miniature Worlds of Walt

New to Gallery 7 within The Walt Disney Family Museum is an enlarged display of the Museum’s tiny treasures, including several pieces of Walt’s unique collection, mentioned in this excerpt from Jim Korkis’s book, The Vault of Walt.

Strangely, for a man who always had big dreams, Walt Disney took some of his greatest delight in the world of miniatures. For decades, he both constructed and collected a huge variety of intricate tiny objects. Sometimes those small objects inspired some much larger ideas, including attractions at the Disney theme parks.

It is believed that Walt first seriously worked with miniatures when he helped build a Lionel train layout for his nephew, Roy E. Disney, in the early thirties, working intently on the surrounding landscaping and structures for the train track.

However, Walt’s fascination with the magical power of tiny worlds was really launched in 1939, when he saw the famous Thorne exhibit at the Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco. Using miniature furnishings and accessories gathered by her uncle during his world travels, Mrs. James Ward Thorne had created exquisite rooms decorated to represent European and American interiors of different eras. It was said that the rooms were so perfectly crafted that viewing them was like becoming miniaturized and then entering another time. Needless to say, they captured Walt’s imagination completely.

In the late forties, Walt merged his love of trains with his love of miniature making to build a small-scale railroad, the “Carolwood Pacific,” that steamed around the backyard of his home on Carolwood Drive. He was especially proud of the bright yellow caboose, with its diminutive oil lamps, brass doorknobs, and actual working spring latches.

Walt painstakingly crafted a pint-sized potbellied stove for the caboose as well. “I had a pattern made up, and it turned out so cute with the grate, shaker and door, and all the little working parts, I became intrigued with the idea,” Walt wrote. “I had a few made up: one was bronze, another black, and I even made a gold one! Then we made more and started painting them in motifs that fitted the period at the turn of the century.”

Each of these 5 1/2" inch tall stoves had a different design, and eventually about one hundred were made. Walt gave some to friends, and even sent some to an antique gift shop in New York where, to Walt’s delight, Mrs. Thorne herself purchased two to add to her renowned collection, the same collection that had inspired Walt’s hobby. They sold for $25 each and Walt made no special effort to market them or make a profit. He was just curious to see if there was any interest and by 1957, the supply was depleted.

“It has been fun making them and others appreciate them, too, so all in all, I feel well repaid,” said Walt.

Walt began seriously collecting miniatures during his European travels, bringing home countless tiny objects of glass, wood, china, and metal. In a letter to a friend in 1951, Walt wrote: “My hobby is a life saver. When I work with these small objects, I become so absorbed that the cares of the studio fade away…at least for a time.”

When Walt’s collection was inventoried in the mid-sixties, the listing was more than a thousand items including paintings and books such as the Holy Bible, Tennyson’s Poetical Works, A Miniature History of England and eighteen volumes of the plays of William Shakespeare. There were musical instruments such as three banjos, a mandolin, a guitar and an organ, crafted by conductor Frederick Stark. A set of dueling pistols was near a leather case inscribed “The Colt Story in Miniature,” that had fourteen six-shooters. There were eleven classic cars, including a 1915 Model T Ford, 1903 Cadillac, 1904 Rambler, and a 1911 Rolls Royce. Walt also displayed a model battleship and steamboat.

However, just collecting these tiny treasures was not enough for Walt. He wanted to create an entire miniature world. In the early fifties, he asked animator Ken Anderson to draw twenty-four scenes of life in an old Western town. Walt planned to carve tiny figures and build the scenes in miniature. When he had made enough, he would send them out as a traveling exhibit.

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Looking Back: Moving the Collection

This is the second of a five-part series that looks back at the Museum's roots and its journey to opening day, Oct. 1st, 2009.

After 2 1/2 years of planning, preparing and packing, the 16,367-artifact collection of the Walt Disney Family Foundation, made its move into its permanent home on December 10, 2008.  The road there had been paved with miles and miles of bubble wrap and large pallet boxes that could create a mansion like fort.

While everyone in the collections department had a hand in helping make the move happen, at the helm were four registrars: Mela Delgado, Jocelyn Park, Rachael Zink, and me.  Our job began on March of 2006 when I was hired as the Registrar for the Foundation.  At the time, the goal was to get everything cataloged  (inventoried and input into a database) before we had to move from our old location at the Gorgas warehouse to our brand new home in the Presidio.  The actual move date was an unknown but the daunting task of getting all this work done was obvious. Miniatures were arranged in case after case, awards were clustered together on walls and one-of-a-kind paintings lined the bright red wall in the conference area. Behind closed doors were 6 museum quality cabinets that housed thousands of artifacts from priceless works on paper to the most unique tin toys. All of it had to be re-located.

In the time leading up to the opening of the Museum, we continued to acquire new artifacts at a feverish pace and it quickly became apparent we would need four more cabinets before we moved into our permanent home as well as more staff. Rachael came on staff as an intern to help pack the miniature collection, which had taken a full year to catalog.  She was later promoted to Associate Registrar, when the original Associate Registrar, Lynne Phillips, moved to the East Coast.  Jocelyn and Mela both came on as interns the following year.  I gave Jocelyn the job of drafting a move plan and Mela was responsible for packing all Walt’s awards, which included making boxes for especially fragile pieces under the direction of, our conservator, Martin Salazar.  Jocelyn left at the end of her internship but Mela was hired on as an assistant registrar.

Once we were given the move date (sometime in November-December 2008), I devised a very detailed packing schedule.  Originally, Rachael and I had envisioned getting pallets and shrink-wrapping all the individual object boxes to large pallets.  This would have been extremely tricky because we would have had to limit the boxes to only a handful of standard sizes and could not have properly secured the objects to the pallets months ahead of time. Luckily, Michael Labrie had the inspired idea of using large pallet boxes that could be attached to the pallets instead.  The pallet boxes were so large that they fit two registrars sitting crossed legged quite comfortably. This eliminated the need to limit the size and shape of our artifact boxes and we were able to safely pack the boxes ahead of time.  Michael devised a system for attaching the boxes to the pallets, which included screws, washers, nuts, and bolts.  This system made our lives much easier; albeit darker.  The only way to secure the pallet boxes to the pallets with the “Labrie screw system” was to flip the box upside down so that the pallet could be attached.  Someone had to get inside the overturned box and hold the screws in place, while someone on the outside would put the pallet on top and secure the bolts.  Needless to say, I always had a flashlight with me. 

Mela, Rachael and I packed 15 pallets in about 3 months!  While all this occurred, we also had monthly artifact selection meetings for the museum and new acquisitions kept pouring into Gorgas. Our schedule was our lifeline and the only thing that kept us organized and sane. 

Meanwhile, Martin Salazar and his two assistants, Issey Honton and Harvey Newman had to create custom boxes for the more fragile items in the collection: over 1200 awards and 20 character model statues.  They ended up creating a very sophisticated box design for the character model statues as well as other standard box designs.  Additionally, they had to devise a system to move our numerous oversized posters.  Their ingenuity afforded us the opportunity to move 1200 posters in 4 simple trays.  While all the packing occurred, this group was also tackling decisions about materials for cases in the museum, preparing the artifacts for exhibition, and devising a system for creating facsimiles.

Mark Gibson had the duty of making sure that every single artifact was photographed or a scanned and he printed images for the curatorial team to use as mock artifacts during the museum case design phase.   Finally, Michael Labrie was busy coordinating the trucks for the move and at the same time dealing with the details of the construction of our new collection storage area as well as the specifics of the exhibits.

Before we headed out to our new home, maps were drawn of the collections area and each pallet was assigned to a different room.   On the day of the move, all the members of the Collections department were assigned a room and were required to direct the pallets in the right direction. Issey had the job of recording the day with his camera. With all the preparation and planning, the move went off without a hitch.   December 10, 2008 was not only a fresh start for the operations of the Walt Disney Family Foundation Collections department, but it was also a great example of how well we work as a team or, better yet, a quirky little family. 

    

   Anel Muller
   Registrar

Looking Back: Our first home: the Gorgas Warehouse

This is the first of a five-part series that looks back at the Museum's roots and its journey to opening day, Oct. 1st, 2009.

In 2003, I was brought to a warehouse in the Presidio of San Francisco to view a collection of memorabilia and artifacts for a museum that was being designed and planned for this location.

To this day and for the rest of my life, I will never forget my first visit -- walking through the double doors and seeing Walt Disney’s 1/8 scale steam locomotive, the Lilly Belle, as well as cases filled with miniatures, and a wall full of Academy Awards!

The wooden structure was built in 1918 to store medical supplies and equipment used at the nearby Letterman Army Hospital. After the hospital was demolished, the new Letterman Digital Arts Center was constructed to be the combined home of Industrial Light & Magic, LucasArts, and Lucasfilm's marketing. This is right down the street from our little warehouse!

Considering this building was a tinderbox filled with treasures, at the time, it wasn’t so obvious that this was the new hub of animation in the Bay Area!

In the very beginning, the Walt Disney Family Museum was established as a ”virtual” museum online, with Disney historians, Richard and Katherine Greene, working as “curators ” of exhibits. Plans of a brick and mortar museum were being developed for an attractive low-key operation where school groups and Disney fans might view this modest collection of awards, citations, and artwork collected by, and attributed to, Walt Disney.

In the collection were Walt’s train, a WWI Ford Model T ambulance similar to the one that he drove in France, his collection of miniatures, as well as a bright red Autopia car from Disneyland. But this modest warehouse was not suited for the groups that would visit, nor was it adequate to house a collection of this importance. Guided by the vision, dedication and passion of Diane Disney Miller and her family, we knew we had to do more. That path lead us to the state-of-the-art building we are now occupying at 104 Montgomery Street.

In 2004 a large portion of the collection was still in boxes, crates, and files in need of proper storage, and documentation of their current condition. As we made progress, storage cabinets were specified and planning for staff was underway. My team for collections management began with a consultant, Paloma Añoveros, an Art Conservator, Martín Salazar, and two Registrar interns, Lynne Philips and Karen Hong, who were completing their masters at the JFK Institute for Museum Studies. It was a daunting task to start from square one, but we all forged ahead.

Martín began evaluating and preserving the collections for storage, study, and exhibition. He was instrumental in establishing our standard for digitally documenting the artifacts and creating a wonderful way to exhibit works on paper (which you will see in the galleries). 

Anel Muller was hired as the Museum Registrar. With Anel came the birth of a new database, a data dictionary, and comprehensive registration planning. Two new assistant registrars were hired, Mark Gibson and Rachael Zink. In addition to making great progress with the collections, Anel gave birth to her first child, Laila. Upon her return from maternity leave, we had a librarian intern, Phil Chiu, who made a large contribution of his time and efforts. Bob Mosley joined the team and supported our immediate IT needs, and planned for the future needs of the institution.

Moving forward, Diane Disney Miller was excited to see we were functioning as a museum! We were dealing with loans to other institutions, cataloguing old and new acquisitions, as well as making the collections available to an onslaught of designers, consultants, contractors, and architects, with back-to-back meetings all for planning the new facilities.

Many new faces joined our team in preparation for the move. Our conservator, Martín managed an intern, Harvey Newman, who created custom boxes for the artifacts. Joined by Issey Honton, with enthusiasm and innate skills, these two young men, worked closely with Martín preparing the artworks on paper for the future exhibitions. Anel and Rachael spearheaded the move, (which you will read about as part of this anniversary series) and Mark Gibson made progress photographing the new acquisitions before becoming Digital Assets Coordinator. Everyone on the team was honing their skills, working hard to get the job done.

Considering the condition, rarity and fragility of the artifacts, and the need for the designers to “get their hands on” the pieces to design the museum cases, we created facsimiles of all the objects for them to use in the design process. It was an effective, productive, and safe way to do the layouts.

As part of this anniversary series, you will find out about the monumental move of all the collections as they traveled from the Gorgas warehouse to our new facilities. You will also learn about the mount-making for all the artifacts on exhibition in our galleries.

All of this preparation and dedication from my team of professionals helped to achieve the goal of bringing the collections of the Walt Disney Family Foundation to the world!

Building photos courtesy of the Bruce Gordon collection at the WDFM.

    

   Michael Labrie
   Director of Collections





From the Collection!

Our guest curator this week is Issey Honton.  Issey is our Conservation and Preparation Technician.  He works closely with Ben Peters in designing and installing the various exhibits in the Museum.

We asked Issey to pick his favorite artifact from the Collection and write about why he chose it. Here's his pick:  

 My favorite object of the collection has to be one of the Heinrich Kley drawings. Kley, born in 1863, is best known for his satirical take on the modern industrial life of his time, as well as his ability to humanize animals. Although not as well-known today as he perhaps should be, his work influenced many artists throughout the 20th Century, including Walt Disney.

I love not only the subject matter of his drawings, but also the aesthetic because it clearly shows the artist's hand and intent.

The inspiration Heinrich Kley brought to Walt Disney is obvious in the animation classic Fantasia, where the animators brought life to many of nature’s little creatures. To me, each drawing is a piece of a storyboard for a tale I already know and love. His drawings speak to me in a language I haven’t spoken in ages: Imagination.

   

  Issey Honton

  Conservation and Preparation Technician