Disney comic artists
in the Comiclopedia

Shortly after the success of animated cartoons in film and television, Walt Disney began producing comics with his characters. Since the 1930s, countless pages of Disney comics have been produced and reproduced worldwide. The production includes not only stories with the most popular characters - Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck - but also movie adaptations, stories with secondary characters, as well as realistic works like 'Zorro' and 'Spin & Marty'. The Disney comics production is among the biggest in the world, and a lot of international artists had their turn making Disney characters. In addition to reprinting American material, some countries began producing material of their own, including Italy, Brazil, France, Denmark and Holland. Below is an overview of the countries that have produced Disney comics, as well as a list of Disney artists that are in the Comiclopedia.

USA

The first of all Disney comics appeared on 13 January 1930. That day, the 'Mickey Mouse' newspaper comic was launched. Soon followed the 'Silly Symphony' Sunday page and the 'Donald Duck' newspaper strip. In 1939, the American publisher Western Printing (in cooperation with Dell Publishing) began publishing a series of one-shot comics called 'Four Color Comics', which also contained Disney material. It was a big success, and a year later, the Disney comics got their own title, 'Walt Disney's Comics and Stories'. Artists that worked for these titles were former Disney animators or staff artists at Western. The most notable of them was Carl Barks, who developed the entire Duck universe. Throughout the years, various characters got their own spin-off title, such as 'Uncle Scrooge' and 'Chip 'n Dale'. When the cooperation with Dell folded, the WDCS title was transferred to Gold Key in 1962, and in the 1970s to Whitman. During this period, the Disney Studios also began producing stories for publication abroad. All US publications were cancelled in 1984, and there was a lot of shifting in the licenses throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Several companies published Disney comics, such as Gladstone (Walt Disney Adventures), Marvel (comics based on recent movies and TV productions), Disney Comics (mainstream characters and TV characters) and, most recenty, Gemstone.

UK

Not long after the launch of the 'Mickey Mouse' newspaper comic in the US, the British company Dean launched the Mickey Mouse Annual. The Annual contained short stories drawn by the British artist Wilfred Haughton. Britain is therefore probably the first European country to produce its own Disney stories. The Mickey Mouse Weekly appeared from 1936 to 1959. During its first years, this tabloid sized magazine had reprints of the American newspapers comics, but also some comics of its own.

Italy

The Italian Disney production also came very close after the American. Only one year after the creation of the strip, the Italian Disney publications took off in 1931. When the American 'Mickey' was already published in Italy, Italian artists Giovanni Bissietta and Guglielmo Guastaveglia did some 'Mickey' one-pagers for various publications. These activities were shortlived, however, since they didn't have any formal agreements with King Features Syndicate, who owned the rights to the strip. Topolino magazine was launched in 1932 by the publisher Nerbini, and continued from 1935 by Mondadori. The first legitimate Italian Disney story was created by Federico Pedrocchi in 1937, who also started his own Paperino title. The big production didn't took off until after World War II, since political differences dissabled the further use of the Disney characters during the War. Since the 1980s, the Italian style in Disney comics developed from a traditional line to an expressive one, initiated by Giorgio Cavazzano. A popular character in Italian comics is Paperinik, Donald's superhero counterpart. When Disney took over the Italian production, a real studio was created, as well as a Disney Academy.

Former Yugoslavia

Although the original 'Mickey Mouse' newspaper strip had been launched only two years earlier, Serbian artists started making their own comics with the character in 1932. That year, Belgrade children's magazine Veseli Cetvrtak printed 'Dozivljaji Mike Misa' ('The Life of Mickey Mouse') by local authors Ivan Sensin and Bozidar Kovacevic. Around the same time, the competing newspaper Vreme published 'Dozivljaji misa Mike i majmuna Djoka' ('The Life of Mickey Mouse and the monkey Djoka') in its children's section Decje Vreme. In March, 1936, editor Aleksandar J. Ivkovic launched Mickey's own magazine, Mika Mis. Besides reprints of American comics, Mika Mis also published stories by local artists. It ran until April 1941, when German bombs were dropped over Belgrade.

Brazil

Disney comics already appeared in Brazil since the 1930s, but they got their own title in 1950: O Pato Donald. The publishing house Abril assigned the Argentine artist Luis Destuet to do cover illustrations, and to teach Brazilian artists to draw in the Disney style. A character that stands out in the Brazilian production is José Carioca, who got his own title in 1961: Zé Carioca. With the launch of Zé Carioca magazine, the Brazilian production of actual comics took off.

France

The French Le Journal de Mickey was launched in 1934 by publisher Paul Winkler of Opéra Mundi in cooperation with Hachette. The magazine reprinted American Disney material, as well as other comics. The magazine ceased publication in 1944. The first art with Disney characters produced for a French magazine was done in 1950, when the Belgian Mickey Magazine commenced publication. Le Journal de Mickey was relaunched two years later, and the actual comics production took off with the series 'Mickey à Travers des Siècles'. In 1978, a new team of French artists joined the production, and the creation of French stories with Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse increased. Besides Hachette, the Disney Europe division in Paris also makes their own comic stories, mainly comic adaptations of movies.

Denmark

The Danish Anders And & Co. first appeared in 1949, and has its own production of stories since the early 1960s. The publishing house Gutenberghus (Egmont, since 1992) assigned Scandinavian artists, as well as Spanish studio artists to work on the Danish production. Besides new stories, the Danish artists initially redrew a lot of already-existing American stories of the time. Nowadays, the Danes have a large production of stories, that are published worldwide.

The Netherlands

In 1952, the Dutch Donald Duck weekly made its first appearance. The magazine contained only American stories in the early years, although the covers were already drawn by Dutch artist Endre Lukacs from 1953. The first Dutch stories appeared in the mid-1960s. These were stories with secondary characters like 'Hiawatha' and the 'Big Bad Wolf', that were written and drawn at the Toonder studios. Publisher De Geïllustreerde Pers took on its own story production in 1969, although the quality was very bad at first. With the arrival of art director Daan Jippes in 1973, the quality increased. De Geïllustreerde Pers became Oberon and later VNU/Sanoma and several Dutch artists had their turn drawing Disney stories.

Misc. (studio) artists

Although most productions have their own national artists, a large part of the artwork is often assigned to foreign artists. Some artists work directly for a publisher, but most of the time, their work is bought through an agency. The largest agency is the Spanish Comicup studios in Barcelona, that was founded in the 1980s by José Cánovas. The studio gets commissions from all European publishers, and sometimes also from the non-European. Other artists assembled co-workers around them and began their own studio, such as Francisco Bargadà, who founded the Recreo Studio, and Vicar. The South American studio of Jaime Diaz provides mainly artwork for the American Disney Studios, primarily movie adaptations and comics with television characters.