Gustaf Tenggren

Gustaf Tenggren
Gustaf Tenggren with children 1950
Born Gustaf Adolf Tenggren
November 3, 1896
Alingsås, Sweden
Died April 9, 1970 (aged 73)
Maine, United States
Burial place Spruce Lawn Cemetery, Lincoln County, Maine, US
Occupation Animator
In Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), Tenggren's presentation drawing depicts the major characteristics of each of the seven dwarfs.

Gustaf Adolf Tenggren (November 3, 1896 – April 9, 1970) was a Swedish-American illustrator. He is known for his Arthur Rackham-influenced fairy-tale style and use of silhouetted figures with caricatured faces. Tenggren was a chief illustrator for The Walt Disney Company in the late 1930s, in what has been called the Golden Age of American animation, when animated feature films such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Fantasia, Bambi and Pinocchio were produced.

Early career

Gustaf Tenggren was born in 1896 in Magra parish (now part of Alingsås Municipality), in Västra Götaland County, Sweden. In 1913 he received a scholarship to study painting at Valand, the art school in Gothenburg, Sweden. Tenggren's early schooling and artistic influences were solidly grounded in Scandinavian techniques, motifs and myths; he worked with illustrating in the popular Swedish folklore and fairy tales annual Bland Tomtar och Troll ("Among Gnomes and Trolls"), where he succeeded illustrator John Bauer.

After his first exhibition in 1920, Tenggren immigrated to the U.S. where he joined his sister in Cleveland, Ohio. Moving to New York City in 1922, he made a name for himself in magazine illustration and advertising, while continuing to illustrate children's books. [1]

Disney Company

In the 1920s, while continuing to illustrate a large number of children's books, Tenggren worked consistently in advertising up until the Depression; in 1936, he was hired by Walt Disney Productions, to work as a chief illustrator with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Tenggren was not only a concept artist on this movie (not an animator), but he did much of the illustrations for the non-animated tie-ins to the film, most notably the serialized version of Snow White which was featured in two successive issues of Good Housekeeping Magazine just prior to the film's release. He later worked with productions such as Bambi and Pinocchio, as well as backgrounds and atmospheres of films such as The Ugly Duckling and The Old Mill.

Children's books

The Poky Little Puppy (1942). Tenggren gave up his Rackham-esque fairy tale illustration style after he left Disney in 1940.

Although his work for Disney was still in the Rackham fairy-tale illustration style, after he left the studio he never painted that way again. From 1942 to 1962, Tenggren worked for Little Golden Books with illustrations for children's books such as Tawny Scrawny Lion; Little Black Sambo and The Poky Little Puppy, which became the single all-time best-selling hardcover children's book in English; and "King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table," Emma Gelders Sterne's retelling of the Arthurian Legend . During these years his production increased, as did the marketability of his name with a stream of Tenggren books.

After he moved to the United States in 1920, he never returned to Sweden again. Gustaf Tenggren died in 1970 at Dogfish Head in Southport, Maine,[2]

Legacy

Although the name Gustaf Tenggren remains relatively unknown, his work is widely recognized, both that in the Disney films and his work in the Little Golden Books. After his death, much of his non-Disney art was donated to the University of Minnesota to be included in the Kerlan Collection, a special library focusing on children's literature.

In memory of Gustaf Tenggren, a 9-meter (30 ft) bronze sculpture of Pinocchio, designed by the American pop artist Jim Dine, has been erected in downtown Borås, a city south of Tenggren's birthplace. At the cost of SEK 9.5 million, the Pinocchio sculpture was supposed to be paid for by private donations. The statue was erected on a tiered pedestal at the beginning of Allégatan, a main street in the center of Borås at the start of the Borås Festival of the Arts on May 16, 2008.

Filmography

Illustrations

Background illustrations

Published works

Illustrations

  • The Ring of the Nibelung (illustrations in a book by Gertrude Henderson)(1932)
  • Stories from a Magic World[3] (illustrations in a book by Elizabeth Woodruff)(1938)

1942

Runaway Home, Elizabeth Coatsworth

Bedtime Stories, Gustaf Tenggren

The Poky Little Puppy, Janette Sebring Lowrey

The Tenggren Tell-it-Again Book, Katharine Gibson

1943

The Lively Little Rabbit, George Duplaix

The Story of England, Beatrice Curtis Brown

Stories from the Great Metropolitan Opera, Helen Dike

Sing for Christmas, Opal Wheeler

1944

Little Match Girl, Hans Christian Andersen

Sing For America, Opal Wheeler

Tenggren´s Story Book, Gustaf Tenggren

1946

Farm Stories, Kathryn and Byron Jackson

The Shy Little Kitten, Cathleen Schurr

1947

The Big Brown Bear, George Duplaix

The Saggy Baggy Elephant, Kathryn and Byron Jackson

1948

Little Black Sambo, Helen Bannerman

Cowboys and Indians, Kathryn and Byron Jackson

1950

The Little Trapper, Kathryn & Byron Jackson

Pirates, Ships and Sailors, Kathryn and Byron Jackson

1951

The Night before Christmas, Clement C. Moore

1952

The Tawny Scrawny Lion, Kathryn and Byron Jackson

1953

Thumbelina, Hans Christian Andersen

Topsy Turvy Circus, George Duplaix

Jack and the Bean Stalk, English Folk Tale

1954

The Golden Goose, Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

1955

The Giant with the Three Golden Hairs, Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

Snow White and Rose Red, Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

1957

Golden Tales from Arabian Nights, Margaret Seifer and Irving Shapiro

1959

The Lion´s Paw: A Tale of African Animals, Jane Werner Watson

1961

The Canterbury Tales, A. Kent Hieatt and Constance Hieatt

References

  • Conrad, JoAnn. Fantasy Imaginaries and Landscapes of Desire: Gustaf Tenggren’s Forgotten Decades
  • John Canemaker, Before the animation begins : the art and lives of Disney inspirational sketch artists, New York : Hyperion, 1996 ISBN 978-0-7868-6152-1
  • Steve Santi, Illustrators/Authors-Collecting Little Golden Books, Florence, Alabamba : Books Americana, 1989 ISBN 978-0-89689-071-8
  • From Swedish fairy tales to American fantasy : Gustaf Tenggren's illustrations 1920-1970, Minneapolis : University Art Museum, University of Minnesota, 1986
  • Pinocchio delar Borås befolkning, by Lars Råde, in the Expressen, March 24, 2006
  • Kultur Väst: Jim Dines Pinoccio har landat
Notes
  1. ↑ Conrad
  2. ↑ https://www.nytimes.com/1970/04/09/archives/gustaf-a-tenggren-childrens-artist.html
  3. ↑ "Amazon.com - Stories from a Magic World". Amazon.com. May 2010. Retrieved 2010-06-02.
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