Carl Barks

Fantagraphics announced earlier this year that it is planning to release a new Carl Barks Library starting later this year. The first book (240-page full-color hardcover) is now available for pre-order on Amazon for only $14.76. Check out this beautiful picture:

The first volume kicks of with some of Barks’ most popular stories from the period 1948 to 1950, including “Lost in the Andes”, “Race to the South” and “The Golden Christmas Tree”.

More information:

• Amazon.com
• Fantagraphics
• Facebook

This oil painting by Carl Barks is titled ‘Halloween in Duckburg’. The 1973 painting is based on the cover of Donald Duck 26, which featured Barks’ story ‘Trick or Treat’ in which Huey, Dewey & Louie team up with a real witch named Hazel to get treats from Donald on Halloween.

The above picture is a scan from the back of issue 3 from 1992 of Dutch Donald Duck Extra, which for a few years printed Barks’ paintings on the back of each issue.

Ehapa Comic Collection in Germany is publishing the Reiseführer Entenhausen mit Stadtplan (“Duckburg Travel Guide with Map”). Information in the guide is solely based on stories by Carl Barks, who created Duckburg and many of its inhabitants. The city that we now know as the home of Donald Duck and the famous Money Bin was first mentioned in his story High Wire Daredevils in 1944.

The 48-page softcover book will be available in Germany on August 10th for €19,95. It has also been seen on Amazon.de, where international orders are possible.

(via F.I.E.S.E.L.S.C.H.W.E.I.F.)

Swedish comic artist Joakim Gunnarsson recently bought two folders with scripts and plot ideas by Carl Barks and today Joakim posted that he found script pages from late 1961 or early 1962 for an unfinished Uncle Scrooge story. The title of the story is Happi Happi Island and on his blog Joakim describes the nine-and-a-half script pages of what would possibly have been a 20-page story.

This is very exciting. It would be great if this material was published somewhere once, or even better: completed and drawn by someone like Daan Jippes. And who knows what other material is still out there!

Last week, a new album in the De Beste Verhalen van Donald Duck (“The Best Stories of Donald Duck”) series came out in the Netherlands. Album number 134 is the first new album in over a year.

“Beste Verhalen” has reprinted (randomly) each story by Carl Barks since 1975. The albums were published regularly for over two decades until the Dutch publisher ran out of stories last year. Album number 132 basically finished with the last few stories written and drawn by the Duck Man himself.

Since album 133, the series has started to publish stories written by Barks, but completed by other artists. There are not too many of these, but it will keep the series going for a little longer. Most significantly these include the 24 Junior Woodchucks stories that Barks wrote in the early 1970s after being lured out of retirement. More »

A while ago I posted pictures of four of the six new statues by Dark Horse of Disney characters based on the art of Carl Barks. The first one of Uncle Scrooge has now come out and the other five will be released in the coming months.

I received my copy of Scrooge a couple of weeks ago and it is indeed beautiful. The Syroco-style small statues come in a special tin with pin and booklet. Each statue is limited to 950 numbered pieces.

The latest two statues in the series will be of Gladstone Gander (release date December 16th) and Beagle Boy 176-761 (February 3rd):

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If you’re going to be in the Baltimore area between July 17th and September 8th, you may want to stop by at Geppi’s Entertainment Museum to see a unique exhibit featuring the largest collection of original Carl Barks artwork ever assembled! A significant percentage of the artist’s 125 oil paintings will be on display, along with preliminaries, studies, statues and comic book pages. The Carl Barks Retrospective will also host a sale of Barks originals, lithographs, statues and other items by Diamond International Galleries during this period.

Check out this great 12-minute documentary about Carl Barks which I found on the Geppi Entertainment Museum website. It’s a very nice video in two parts about Barks’ career. The video ends with Barks’ 95th birthday held at a gallery of his oil paintings.

Source: geppismuseum.com

Dark Horse is releasing some gorgeous Disney statuettes in the Syroco-style based on the artwork by Carl Barks. The statues will be released in a special litho-printed full-color tin with a vintage pin-back button and booklet and are limited to 950 numbered pieces. The statues can be pre-ordered at TFAW.com for $49.99 each, although the Scrooge statue has apparently already sold out (source: here and here).

There will be six statues in total: Uncle Scrooge (release date: September 16th), Donald Duck (September 9th), Gyro Gearloose and Helper (October 21st), Magica de Spell (October 7th), Gladstone Gander and one of the Beagle Boys. All except Donald are characters created by Carl Barks.

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In a story that has Disney comics fans around the world buzzing with excitement, a collector in Italy has uncovered what he believes is the original artwork of Carl Barks’ lost Golden Apples story from 1952. Olaf S. Pirlo, a life-long collector and afficianado of Disney comics, in particular the art of famous Disney artist Carl Barks, was able to obtain several boxes with archived material from the offices of Western Publishing in California, for which Barks worked for three decades. The Golden Apples story is to be published in a special collector’s book in Italy this summer and is expected to be picked up by other Disney publishers across Europe later in the year. More »

German Donaldist Jürgen Wollina has released a map of the fictitious town of Duckburg that he has worked on for the last 13 years. Every detail on the map is based on something from a Carl Barks comic book story. Carl Barks wrote and drew thousands of pages of Disney comics from 1942 to 1966 and created Duckburg as well as Scrooge McDuck, the Beagle Boys, Gladstone Gander and many other characters. Donaldists are fans and collectors who research Disney comics and those stories by Barks in particular. More »