Animation Artifacts &Bill Peckmann &Layout & Design &Models 13 Sep 2010 07:34 am
Dolores Cannata
- Dolores Cannata was one of a group of art students that was pulled in to The Boing Boing show to help design the seventy five new shorts, all differently designed, for the series that CBS had just signed on to. She designed The Trial of Zelda Belle and Just Believe in Make Believe for the show.
When The Boing Boing Show was cancelled she moved to work for Abe Liss’ commercial company, Elektra, where she worked with other designers like Cliff Roberts, Pablo Ferro, Hal Silvermintz, Fred Mogubgub and her brother, George Cannata Jr.
Photo from Amid Amidi’s Cartoon Modern
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What follows are a number of sketches for characters that Dolores did for Elektra. These were all saved by Bill Peckmann who has allowed me to post this small tribute to the fine work of Dolores Cannata.
1The first two color sketches are personal and not production related.
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A negative stat . . .
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. . . which looks like this when cleaned up and reversed.
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A few shopkeepers for a commercial in the 60s.
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Followed by some kids.
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Some Arabian Nights themed coffee spot.
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A couple of gas attendants.
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Some sea captains.
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. . . and a lion.
on 13 Sep 2010 at 11:49 am 1.Ray Kosarin said …
These are beautiful.
1950s character designs, cribbed from print and UPA, were so often abused then and to this day as little more than a design cheat easy to draw and animate. Only a small handful of fine and commercial artists transcended the cheap swagger of the look and drew characters both graphically simple and infused with nuance and soul. Saul Steinberg, William Steig, Syd Hoff, Jules Feiffer, for a few examples, made art worth looking at this half century later.
Dolores Cannata’s work has much of the same charm, sophistication and depth (I’m pretty sure I’ve ‘met’ in real life most of the shopkeepers she drew in this posting).
Thanks, Bill and Michael, for sharing her work.