Art: The Wild Swans by Anna & Elena Balbusso

Apparently the Once Upon A Blog... Gallery of Enchanted Arts, turned two years old yesterday! In an

effort to spread more fairy tale love and awareness through various social media sites, Tumblr was one of those spots on the web that I set-up not too long ago (well, I guess it's two years ago!). I don't mention it much but I do try to post some new fairy tale every week or more often, so if you ever need more beautiful fairy tale images, go take a look.

(Of course Pinterest remains my main image hunting and gathering spot and that rarely overlaps with any other social media at all. It's not quite daily but almost!)

In honor of milestones I thought I'd add an art post for today, especially as on Tumblr I don't tend to post all the work from one book or by one artist at once - I like to spread out the visual fun there but seeing all the images from one story is inspiring to me to, so today we're looking at one of my favorite tales The Wild Swans.

The artists for this stunning looking book are Anna and Elena Balbusso. They're Italian twin sisters and have been working as a team in art and illustration for over fifteen years, something you don't see too often (anyone else immediately thinking Snow White and Rose Red?) You can read more about their works and many awards, HERE, while their main website is HERE.

Let the illustration gorgeousness begin! (You can click on the images to see them full sized.)

Incidentally, the scene above, with Eliza, (or whatever name she goes by in the various tales), being bathed and having cursed, poison toads put in with her, that hopped onto her head and heart etc but then changed to poppies, was my favorite as a child from this story.

As much as I am fascinated - and love! - the whole boys-turning-into-swans (and back again) aspect, it's this bathing scene which was so very vivid to me. Perhaps it was the colors mentioned or perhaps the clear symbolism but finding illustrations of this scene proved quite difficult for many years. So this is the scene I storyboarded (but which no one will ever see..).

Below is the full cover of the book these illustrations are from. I wish the front illustration was available to view without the added graphics for the read-aloud book, but nonetheless, I just love it.

The Magic Swan Geese (1949)

 I recently came across this darling little Russian fairy tale film, "Гуси Лебеди" (roughly translated as "Geese Swans") made in 1949. Although the animators have clearly seen the Disney films made up to that point there's a lot in here that Disney wasn't doing at the time as well.

The film is completely charming and a real pleasure to watch. It's extremely well crafted with what can only be described as "genuine" quality to it. The fairy tale aspect is very clear with this feeling of a storybook coming to life (I didn't realize it was a fairy tale film when I started watching but quickly realized it must be). One of my favorite fairy tale characters, Baba Yaga, makes an appearance too. Of course. ;)

Here's a brief synopsis of the fairy tale The Magic Swan Geese that the film is based on:

A couple left their daughter in charge of her younger brother, but she lost track of him, and the magic swan geese snatched him away. She chased after him and came to an oven. It offered to tell her if she ate its rye buns; she scorned them, saying she doesn't even eat wheat buns. She also scorned similar offers from an apple tree, and a river of milk. She came across a little hut built on a hen's foot, in which she found Baba Yaga with her brother; Baba Yaga set her to spin flax and left. A mouse scurried out and said it would tell her what she needed to know if she gave it porridge; she did, and it told her that Baba Yaga was heating the bath house to steam her, then she would cook her. The mouse took over her spinning, and the girl took her brother and fled.
Baba Yaga sent the swan geese after her. She begged the river for aid, and it insisted she eat some of it first; she did, and it sheltered her. When she ran on, the swan geese followed again, and the same happened with the apple tree and the oven. Then she reached home and safety.

While the film doesn't follow this plot exactly, much of it is similar. Enjoy!

PS There's an interesting little side journey into Russian film music that includes information on this film HERE. If you're interested in these tales or Russian fairy tale animation I recommend it. It has links to some other treasures too, most notably this little film here. (TWELVE BROTHERS/WILD SWAN alert!)

B&tB 'Swamp Thing' Poster

Swamp Thing by Florian Bertmer for Mondo. This is the best poster I've seen playing up the Beauty & the Beast angle. I also love the single play of red against green which makes it feel even more fairy tale like. 


A little while back I saw what appears to be an amateur fairy tale illustration of four panels in black and white with the only color in them being the red of a hood, a rose and of blood. It really brought out how strong symbolism can be in fairy tales. After a bit of a hunt I found the illustration but not the original source to give credit to. If you know the artist, please let me know and I'll update the post.

Red In Fairy Tales - Artist Unknown

Kelley Lubsen's 'The Seven Swans' and Other Fairy Tale Art

A recent lovely fairy tale discovery on deviantArt, this picture of the Seven Swans is so beautiful I wish I could get a copy for my wall (one of all-time my favorite tales and I grew up with a single book with '7' swans as opposed to the six or twelve that were included in the fairy tale collections). You can see a much larger version with deviantArt stamp HERE.

You can definitely see the Trina Schart Hyman influence (one of my favorite illustrators and apparently one of hers,according to her bio on deviantArt) and I don't think that's a bad thing at all. In fact, more please!

The artist, Kelley Lubsen, known as FAyliN on deviantArt, is a recent graduate of University of the Arts (May 2010) and while she doesn't have a huge gallery on deviantArt it's worth taking a look all the same (click HERE). Fortunately, she also has an online gallery with her latest work HERE including some pieces from the Three Little Pigs and Peter Pan (see small examples at left & a HUGE version HERE, noting you'll have to scroll down a long way to find them). It's a little brighter and still lovely (though I adore the muted tones myself) and the truly gorgeous colored pencil work continues.

I do hope she continues to pursue fairy tale illustration and wish her the best of luck in her career.

Behind-the-Scenes of Vogue's "The Wild Swans"

A sincere thank you to Jordan Scott (a.k.a. J.R.D.S.) for kindly alerting me to the fact that this video was already up (I guess, as Mr. Scott said, they meant November 23rd, not December 23rd).

Here's a real treat: the behind-the-scenes video of the fashion shoot for vogue Korea's 'fairy tale issue for December 2009, specifically the shoot for "The Wild Swans".I'm embedding two versions: one with English subtitles and one without. While both have text on the screen, the English subtitled one does cover some of the images you may be interested in. Interestingly, the models all talk about their impressions of the story and what they think we can learn from it.

Enjoy!

No English subtitles:


With English subtitles:



While I found these on YouTube, the Vogue Korea website Mr. Scott alerted me to with the original video is HERE.

The models for this shoot were the popular 'boy band' members of SHINee and Korean star Seo-hyun.

There are obviously scenes shown in this behind-the-scenes that I haven't found photos of on the web anywhere (I got some poor quality screen caps as examples) so that's another reason to go find this fairy tale themed issue of Vogue Korea (December 2009). Nice stuff!

I should also mention Jordan Scott's fascinating website of little known animated fairy tales from around the world called "The Palace of Animated Drawings". It's worth taking some time to look through properly - there are some real gems there. You can find it HERE.

The Wild Swans in Vogue Korea's December 2009 Issue

Not only did Vogue Korea interpret the fairy tale The Wild Swans with Korean celebrities for the December 2009 issue, but there are other tales interpreted with high fashion too.

Today I'll only show you The Wild Swans, as there's plenty to look at from just that shoot. This is one of my favorite fairy tales, so I'm pleased to see any mention of it. Being styled for a fashion magazine is completely unexpected. They've done a light and lovely approach which makes it even better (just ignore the straw - among other things - on their heads/sticking out of their clothes if it bothers you - it's a fantasy after all...)

I'm guessing at the order of the photos. My 'google translate' and 'babelfish' can't seem to translate more than a few words per page on the Vogue Korea site.I think I may have to find myself a copy of this international Vogue issue as this is just one of the articles using fairy tales.

You can learn more about the shoot HERE at Vogue Korea or HERE.

Stay tuned for more fairy tales in high fashion from Vogue Korea over the coming week...