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The "Collecting Disney" auction, held by Van Eaton Galleries
on June 18 in Los Angeles, will offer more than 700 lots from
the Disney archives, expected to fetch between $2 million and $3
million.
Among the items on sale, which are coming from the collections
of private owners, is one of the first dolls ever made of the
anthropomorphic Mickey Mouse, one foot signed by Disney and
given as a gift to a woman, estimated to fetch between $50,000
and $70,000, said gallery owner Mike Van Eaton.
"This particular doll was given to woman that he drove an
ambulance with in 1917 in World War One. A lifelong friend of
his, he gave her one of his most cherished possessions and he
signed it on the bottom in French dedicated to her," Van Eaton
said.
A set of furniture from Disney's office, designed by Kem Weber,
is estimated to fetch between $60,000 and $80,000, while an
original score of the first ever song written about Mickey Mouse
is expected to fetch between $15,000 and $20,000.
Disney co-founded an animation studio in 1923, which eventually
grew into a feature film production studio with films such as
"Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," "Bambi" and "Cinderella." He
died in 1966 aged 65.
The Walt Disney Company is now one of Hollywood's top players,
producing live action and animated feature fare.
The auction is centered on the history of the Disney studio, Van
Eaton said. The items will be exhibited ahead of the sale from
May 25 through June 17 at the Van Eaton Galleries.
"It wasn't the films the made the studio so much, it was the
merchandise, the marketing of the characters that really made
Disney what it is today and that's what we're trying to show in
this auction," Van Eaton said.
Other highlights from the sale include early original drawings
of the first two Mickey Mouse cartoons, 1928's "Steamboat
Willie" and 1929's "Plane Crazy," expected to fetch upwards of
$4,000.
A program for the studio's first animated feature, 1937's "Snow
White," signed by Disney and more than 50 staff members, is
expected to fetch upwards of $5,000.
(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy; Editing by Cynthia Osterman and
Sandra Maler)
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