Timon & Pumbaa gag from Einfach Tierisch #5, 2004 - © Disney
Fernando Güell is a Spanish comic artist and illustrator, who began drawing Disney comics in the 1980s. He has since then worked as a designer/illustrator for Disney Consumer Products and as art director for the production house of the Danish Disney licensee, Egmont Creative Center.
Early life and career
Born in Barcelona in 1959, Fernando Güell inherited his talent for drawing from his mother, who was an illustrator. At age nine, he sent the Walt Disney Company some of his drawings for reviewing, but was adviced to keep practicing. He did, and by age fourteen, he had already illustrated four children's books. Between 1975 and 1980, Güell attended the Sant Jordi University of Fine Arts in Barcelona. His freelance career took off in 1977, producing artwork for books, advertisements and toys. For Spanish companies like Educa Pagsa and Busquets, he designed games and greeting cards.
1987 'Little Hiawatha' story D9046 (published in Germany in Micky Maus #11, 1993) - © Disney.
Disney comics
Working through the agencies Tello Art and later Selecciones Ilustradas, Güell made his first Disney comic art for the Danish publisher Gutenberghus (since 1992 operating under the name Egmont). Between 1984 and 1988, he produced artwork for stories with the Disney characters Goofy, Winnie the Pooh, Br'er Rabbit, Li'l Hiawatha and his personal favorite, Mickey Mouse. By 1987, he switched to illustrating children's books, working with American companies like Disney Press, Random House and Disneyland LA, as well as Egmont Kids in Europe.
Disney Consumer Products
In 1991, Güell was contacted by the recently created Disney Consumer Products (DCP) division in Paris, France. From this collaboration came designs for companies including Nestlé, Hasbro and Mattel. He also continued to make illustrations for print products, most notably the Magic English series (Planeta de Agostini, Italy), Trafic Rutiere (Egmont, Denmark) and covers for Minnie Mag and the Walt Disney Collection Mystère (both for Hachette, France). In 1997 he worked for DCP as a character designer, making stylistic corrections for different projects throughout Europe. He also worked on some style guides for DCP.
Taller Fantástico
In 1995, Güell started his own illustration and design company - Taller Fantástico S.L. - through which he has worked in collaboration with other artists on more complex character design and storytelling projects. Güell and his team designed mascots for companies such as Port Aventura, NH Hotels, Español Football Club and the Catalan Socialist Party. Through his company, he has also created trademarked names, such as Baby Baby and Fulljungle.
Egmont Creative Center
Since 2000, Fernando Güell has been Art Director for the Danish production of Disney comics, handled by Egmont Creative Center (nowadays called Egmont Global Content). Through his Barcelona studio, he does art corrections and training of new talent. One of the first artists trained by Güell was the Dane Jesper Lund Madsen. In the mid-2010s, Güell organized a training program in collaboration with the Joso School for Comics and Visual Arts, which spawned new Disney talent such as Diego Bernardo Álvarez, Cynthia Campanario Pineda, Joan Crexells Aparicio, Xavi Martin Sancho, Sebastián Puñales and Lourdes Rueda Sala.
In addition to his work as art director, Güell has continued to produce artwork for Egmont and its subsidiaries, including a great many stock illustrations ("vignettes"). With writer Per Hedman, he made the gag first set of pages starring the 'Lion King' characters Timon and Pumbaa for the German magazine Einfach Tierisch, published by Ehapa (2003-2005). The rest of the gags were drawn by Angel Rodriguez. Güell and Hedman's further contributions to Einfach Tierisch were stories with characters from the Disney movies 'The Little Mermaid' (2002-2003), 'Junglebook' (2003-2004), 'The Lion King' (2003-2004) and '101 Dalmatians' (2003-2004). He additionally drew new 'Winnie the Pooh' stories (2006-2010), and did the layouts for the Disney Fairies sub-series 'Secret of the Wings' (2012), which had finished pencil art by the Italians Gianluca Barone, Marino Gentile and Sara Storino.
'Jungle Book' story D 2003-230 (publication in the Netherlands in Donald Duck #35, 2007). © Disney.