After I purchased my first cel through eBay, I found that it was sold through a gallery (I guess they were trying to get rid of it, becasue they certainly don't list their whole stock on there).
Anyway, I began looking for more information about galleries that sold animation art. Naturally, I wanted to see more of what was out there! I also started doing general research into cels. At this point in time I became aware of the abiliy to ask a gallery to seek specific artwork.
Eventually I stumbled upon some YouTube videos by a woman named Leslie Combemale, who owns ArtInsights: Animation and Film Art Gallery (http://artinsights.com/). These videos, known collectively as the ArtInsights Collector's Education Series (ACES) seek to teach collector's more about their hobby, including thisngs to think about when collecting.
The first video I watched is below:
You will note that she mentions The Little Mermaid specifically at the end in regards to seals. These authenticity seals (or lack thereof) are the bane of collecting these things! If the cel does not have a seal, and its provenence cannot be traced back to a specific set of animators (who got a few cels as part of their contract for the project) then it was highly likely removed illegally from the studio.
I am not interested in building up a collection of stolen artwork, but I see soooooo many pieces being carried by other galleries. One even appeared on Amazon.com!
After watching a few ACES videos (Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/artinsights) I decided to contact Leslie with a small list of requests (in reality, there's something from almost every scene I'd be interested in, but I did have a few favourites on my mind), who replied and actually got right onto my request! Naturally, all these scenes were gone from the achives, but she found me some BEAUTIFUL pieces, which I bought (and will upload when I get the scanning thing figured out) and am VERY happy with.
I mainly deal with Leslie and ask my questions of her. Not only does she not touch those nasty unsealed pieces with a forty-foot pole, but she is extremely knowlegeable about Disney and the artwork she is dealing with (you'd be shocked at how little some galleries know about the stuff they're selling). There's also that personal touch she adds, which is becoming harder and harder to find with the advent of e-commerce.
Occasionally a piece will appear on eBay or somewhere else which has nothing to do with ArtInsights, but I still generally consult Leslie and keep her involved in my growing collection.
So if you collect production artwork from ANYTHING Disney, or you'd like to start, certainly get into contact with Leslie!
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