Ken Anderson (animator)
Kenneth B. "Ken" Anderson (March 17, 1909 – December 13, 1993) was an American animator, art director, layout artist, and storyboard artist at Walt Disney Animation Studios for 44 years. He had been named by Walt Disney as his "jack of all trades".[1]
Ken Anderson
March 17, 1909
December 13, 1993 (aged 84)
- Animator
- art director
- layout artist
- storyboard artist
- concept artist
- character designer
- visual development artist
1933–1992
3
Born in Seattle, Washington, Anderson studied architecture at the University of Washington. He later studied at the École des Beaux-Arts and the American Academy in Rome. When he returned to the United States, Anderson worked for six weeks at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer before joining Walt Disney Productions in 1934. He worked as an inbetweener and was promoted to an animator. His first major assignment was the Silly Symphonies short Three Orphan Kittens (1935). He later moved to the layout department. For Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), Anderson designed layouts, experimented with the multiplane camera, and built a model of the dwarfs' cottage.[2]
Anderson served again as an art director on Pinocchio (1940) and Fantasia (1940) for The Pastoral Symphony segment. Anderson worked closely with Mary Blair in adapting her visual style for The Three Caballeros (1944) and Song of the South (1946). He also worked on the story development for Melody Time (1948), So Dear to My Heart (1948), and Cinderella (1950).[2]
During the 1950s, Anderson joined WED Enterprises, in which he designed several Fantasyland "dark rides" for the Disneyland theme park. He subsequently worked as a production designer on Sleeping Beauty (1959) and introduced the Xerography technique for One Hundred and One Dalmatians (1961). He later contributed background and character designs for The Jungle Book (1967), The Aristocats (1970), Robin Hood (1973), The Rescuers (1977), and Pete's Dragon (1977).[3] He retired in 1978, but he rejoined WED Enterprises a year later to help renovate Fantasyland. On December 13, 1993, Anderson died from a stroke.
Biography[edit]
Early life[edit]
Anderson was born in Seattle, Washington on March 17, 1909. He was the son of Luther Anderson Sr., a lumber merchant, and Ethel Way. He had two sisters, Ruth and Roberta.[4] When Anderson was three years old, his family moved to the Philippines (then a territory of the United States).[5] On a ship back to the United States, his father died from malaria when he was ten, leaving their family destitute. Anderson's sister, Ruth, also died around the same time.[4] Anderson's mother sent him to live with his uncle who abused him, forcing him to run away and lived in the woods. "I figured life was too damn hard," he recalled, "so I found a log cabin and caught 127 trout for my dinner and lived there for a month before they found me."[6] Meanwhile, Anderson's mother Ethel finished her training as a schoolteacher and was hired for a teaching position in Seattle. His mother reclaimed him, and at age twelve, he began working several minor jobs to put himself through school.[6]
Anderson studied architecture at the University of Washington. He then won a scholarship where he studied at the École des Beaux-Arts at Fontainebleu in Fontainebleau, France, to which he claimed "no one had won west of the Mississippi before."[6] He later studied at the American Academy in Rome for two and a half years. Anderson returned to the United States in 1933 during the Great Depression.[7]
1933–1942: the Silly Symphonies, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the Golden Age of Animation[edit]
Due to a scarcity in architectural jobs, Anderson was hired for a six-week position as a set designer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer on The Painted Veil (1934) and What Every Woman Knows (1934). He recalled his time at MGM was "a most unhappy experience" and his wife was "fed up with our living on credit."[8] One day, when Anderson and his wife Polly were driving around the Disney studios near Hyperion Avenue, she said, "Why don't you go in there and get a job?" He refused at first, to which she fought back: "You need a job. We've got to have a job. We're living off these canned beans down at the beach and we can't keep doing that."[9]
Anderson returned to the studio and displayed his watercolor architectural paintings, which impressed Walt Disney. He was called back the next day and hired for a two-week tryout in the Inbetween Department.[10][7] Polly herself was hired as a painter in the Ink and Paint department, employed there for three years until she became pregnant with her first daughter. On September 3, 1934, Anderson began working as an inbetweener working in a large room "doing various fill-in scenes in various pictures" with other junior animators, including Milt Kahl, Ollie Johnston, Frank Thomas, Jack Hannah, and James Algar.[11] His first projects were the Silly Symphonies shorts, including The Goddess of Spring (1934) and Three Little Wolves (1936), and Mickey's Polo Team (1936).[12]
Disney admired Anderson's skill in perspective drawing and selected him to animate on the Silly Symphonies short Three Orphan Kittens (1935).[11] Anderson recalled, "[Walt Disney] gave me several scenes in Three Orphan Kittens, in which I animated the kittens and the backgrounds. The camera traveled along with the kittens at their eye level to show the surroundings as they saw it."[12] The short won the 1935 Academy Award for Best Short Subject (Cartoons).[13]
After Three Orphan Kittens, Disney offered Anderson a position in the Layout Department, headed by Charles Phillippi and Hugh Hennesy.[11] One evening, in 1934, Anderson was first notified of Disney's plans for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) when Disney acted out the entire story to his animation staff on a soundstage.[14][15][16] Feeling motivated by Disney's performance,[14][11] Anderson was assigned with special effects animator Cy Young, lighting expert Hal Halvenston, and engineer Bill Garity to design moving backgrounds for an animation test of a peddler woman in the forest, meant to display actual depth and perspective. Using an experimental multiplane camera, Anderson drew three planes of animated trees, which were placed on large glass plates, and had the team experiment with distances. Disney was pleased with the results and ordered another test of the dwarfs' cottage and Snow White.[17][18]
Personal life and death[edit]
Anderson met his wife Polly at the University of Washington and were married during the summer of 1934.[6] They had three daughters named Sue, Judy and Wendy.[75]
On December 13, 1993, Anderson died in La Cañada Flintridge, California from complications of a stroke, at the age of 84.[75][76][77]