Haunted Mansion's 45th Anniversary!

HAUNTED MANSION 45TH ANNIVERSARY COLLECTOR'S ART DISNEYLAND GALLERY MIKE PERAZA

"Welcome Foolish Mortals ... " to a celebration of Disneyland's horribly humorous hair-raising Haunted Mansion. As most of you know, there are multiple versions of this spooktacular attraction at Disney parks around the world with each one celebrating their unique differences from the architecture outside to many of the ride elements inside. The one located at Disneyland is of course the ominous original, opening it's creaky doors to the public on August 9,1969. This year celebrates its 45th year of happy haunting. I was asked to create some eerie original artwork to celebrate this tombstone... I mean milestone, and so I'm unveiling part of my ghostly gouache. Before I get to the painting however, a bit of history of the Haunted Mansion is in order, and for goodness sakes don't you dare pull back on the safety bar, we'll do it for you! Disneyland's Haunted Mansion 45th Anniversary artist Mike Peraza HAUNTED MANSION, 

Harper Goff's early rendition of the attraction

Walt Disney first considered a haunted house attraction in Disneyland two decades before the first shovel was turned to lay the attraction's groundwork. The original sketches by Harper Goff for the structure included drawings for a gothic mansion resembling (at least to me) the one that would be built years later in 1960 for Hitchcock’s Psycho with a graveyard and church sharing the plot.

However when Disneyland lowered its drawbridge and opened its magical castle to the public on July 17, 1955, it did so without the benefit of a spine tingling creepy crypt. In 3 short years however, Walt's never ending park expansion created a new land named “New Orleans Square” (being a native of the "big easy" I certainly like the sound of that) which would provide literally lay the foundation for the spook house in 1962. HAUNTED MANSION 45TH ANNIVERSARY COLLECTOR ART

Ken Anderson's original design

Sam McKim's color interpretation

Although early concepts by Ken Anderson portrayed the mansion as an old dilapidated haunted house, Walt Disney thought that might be a grave mistake and wanted it to have a pristine look to match the rest of the park. As numero uno imagineer Walt himself put it, "We'll take care of the outside and let the ghosts take care of the inside."

It then stood empty for years while the Disney company concentrated on its responsibilities for the 1964 World's Fair. When Walt Disney passed away in 1966, the imagineers were in the midst of planning the new attraction. They were suddenly at a loss of whether to make the attraction scary like Claude Coats had wanted or funny like Marc Davis had planned. Actually "loss" is not accurate when recounting those times.

One of many Marc Davis concepts

The imagineers I talked to, including Marc and Claude themselves (and they o'uta know, ya know ) described the situation a bit like going into battle without a commanding general to coordinate the troops. In the end of course they combined both directions into an eerie entertaining experience that people line up for to this day.

Haunted Mansion 45th Event
Mike Peraza

As many of you may know who have read my blog over the years, two of my mentors: Disney Legends Ward Kimball and Ken O’Connor used to advise me in essence to be a chameleon. In other words, don’t just create in one style or medium but be open to many approaches but try to do each well. In this respect I created my newest piece to celebrate the Haunted Mansion’s 45th in a style I like to refer to as “retro ” and  let me tell you, it was a hoot to work on. I wanted to avoid doing the "stretches" or just limit myself to the "hitch hikers" and hoped to include as much of the ride in the image as possible without getting too complicated. I solved the problem by using a whimsical approach and starting with a simple base composition to build upon. The end result is almost a companion piece to my "Seasons of Magic" painting that was very well received by Disney fans and was subsequently showcased in the Disney Gallery vault for many months.

As my wife Patty put it, “It’s an advertising style that was being used when the original attraction opened, so it’s fitting to return to that stylized look to celebrate it 45 years later!" She has so many good ideas and of course if you want a happy life- you keep a happy wife, so I used her suggestion. And once again I'm also using the medium of choice from the old Disney Studio of the 1930s through the 1960s which is gouache with the original illustration measuring 18 x 24 inches. You can see it within the ad poster to the left. The look was decidedly different from my previous pieces for the Disney Gallery Steampunk Show . Once I had finalized my thumbnails, it was frighteningly fun adding little hidden treasures among the Haunted Mansion many points of interests. Mike Peraza Haunted Mansion 45th Anniversary collector poster. HANTED MANSION

Yale Gracey and "Hat box"

Yale Gracey with chip off the old block

I even included cryptic characters from the ride that were removed from the attraction  like the legendary “Hat box Ghost" although he is making a "spirited" return . Here's a photo of Yale Gracey working on that original problem child that never seemed to come off the way they had hoped. Before he transferred to WED, Yale was a brilliant layout guy for Jack Hannah back in the day doing Donald Duck shorts among many other projects at the old studio. When Jack introduced him to me I had no idea he was an imagineer at that time because the discussion was mainly centered on animation and layout from his work at the old Disney Studio. When he eventually got around to sharing Disneyland stories I was even more blown away by Yale's accomplishments.

The original design of the Hatbox
Ghost by Collin Campbell

He was a nice guy and is missed to this day by everyone who was fortunate to know him. If you ever wondered if there was a real "Master Gracey", well this is the amazing gentleman who was honored with that title.

 Mike Peraza whimsical take on Hat Box Ghost

By the way, the original design for the "Hat Box Ghost" was by another old friend, Collin Campbell and is included here. Speaking of "Hatty", here is my retro rendition of that ghastly ghost. I have also planted multiple “hidden Mickeys” and other treasures throughout the graphic graveyard so have fun unearthing them. Before you pull down on the safety bar even though we told you not to, come on down to the Disney Gallery and join our spirited celebration of the Haunted Mansion's 45th!

Part of the crowd waiting outside to get in,
while there was just as many inside waiting to get out.

If you're looking to pick up fine art prints signed for you by their apparitional artists celebrating the Haunted Mansion's 45th but worried your walls are too full, let me paraphrase the last line you hear when leaving the Haunted Mansion, "...there's always room for one more." So come on out August Saturday 16, 9:00 AM to the Disneyland Gallery located on Main Street, on the right when you enter the park. I'll be there along with a ghoulish group of extremely talented and terrifying artists just dying to meet you.

UPDATE: The signing event was huge success and sold out of all of my paper prints, canvas prints and the original painting before it was even half over. I had the pleasure of meeting so many incredible folks who came by to pick up a print and then stuck around to talk and share some great times while I signed. Of course that is wonderful news but what is also exciting is that prints are again available at the Disney Gallery for my "Happy Haunts" in both formats and will continue to be offerred for all of the Haunted Mansion fans out there.

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