‘Beauty’ Artwork

“Selling of the Cel: Disney to Market Computer Images” (April 30) contained erroneous conclusions about the upcoming auction of artwork from “Beauty and the Beast.” I would like to set the record straight.

First, Disney is not marketing computer images, as your headline reported. On the contrary, all the “Beauty” artwork to be offered at auction has been hand-painted by Disney artists. While the computer was used as a tool to enhance the animation, the specially created cels were not created on the computer. And the drawings used as the basis for the cels were drawn by hand--as animators did for the very first animated film.

Second, while the cels were not photographed for the making of the film, it was not mentioned early in the article that the artwork features hand-painted production backgrounds. The cels were created to accompany the backgrounds and provide the story context for the animated action. They are secondary to the background paintings and should not be construed as the focus of the artwork to be auctioned.

Third, and most important, it is not our intention to “dupe” the consumer into believing that these cels are production cels. Since the early days at the studio, Disney has been offering original animation art to the public through art galleries. We have never misrepresented the artwork we offered--and will never do so.

Animation art from Disney films has been highly coveted by collectors. During the production of “Beauty and the Beast,” we recognized that the film had the same tremendous appeal as the other fairy tales adapted by Disney Studios into animated features and that collectors would embrace the opportunity to own a piece of this film. Therefore, to meet this demand, we decided to offer “Beauty and the Beast” production backgrounds with specially created cels. ROY E. DISNEY

Vice Chairman of the Board

The Walt Disney Co.