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Estimate: $ 500 - $ 700
OLLIE JOHNSTON (1912-2008) Baloo. Animator's production drawing of Baloo the bear from the production of the Disney classic, The Jungle Book, 1967. Blue colored pencil on 16 field Disney punched paper. 12 1/2 x 15 1/2 inches. Signed and Inscribed, "All good wishes from Ollie Johnston. Bears a frame number in bottom right corner.
This wonderfully expressive drawing corresponds to the end of the film, when Mowgli decides to follow Shanti into her village, and the panther Bagheera reassures a dismayed Baloo: "It was bound to happen. Mowgli is where he belongs now." -to which Baloo replies "Yeah, I guess you're right. But I still think he would have made one swell bear" -upon which the duo breaks into a reprise of "The Bare Necessities."
Ollie Johnston was one of the most celebrated of Walt Disney's so-called "Nine Old Men." In addition to animating Baloo and other Jungle Book characters, Johnston provided animation, and was often directing animator, for some of the most beloved characters in the Disney canon, a small sampling of which includes: Pinocchio (1940); Bambi and Thumper (1942); B'rer Rabbit, Fox, and Bear in Song of the South (1946); Alice and the Queen of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland (1951); Lady, Jock, and Trusty in Lady and the Tramp (1955); Flora, Fauna, and Merriweather in Sleeping Beauty (1959), Merlin, Arthur, and Archimedes in The Sword in the Stone (1961), and Robin Hood, Little John, Prince John, and Sir Hiss in Robin Hood (1973), among countless others.
Johnston and his longtime collaborator and friend Frank Thomas also penned the landmark 1981 animation book Disney Animation: The Illusion of Life, in which the animators shared their in-depth knowledge of the Disney animation process. This book has been an essential reference to many an aspiring animator since.
