Happy New Year 2024 with MimiWood
Today, let's talk about... Betty Boop !
You can find the full article on my Substack blog ‘This is the story of a French illustrator’
MimiWood wishes you lots of sweetness and happiness for 2024, but also to find your own paths and believe in your dreams. I hope this beginning of the year is going well for you. Perhaps you have switched on the cocooning and hibernation mode, you hate the word “resolutions”, and you just want to be left alone under your blanket with a good book.
To thing about something else, I have a little story for you
Let me ride you into my inspirations. This winter period is very creative for me, and I have a strong tendency to indulge in my ramblings. That’s how, one fine foggy morning, I found myself reading the incredible story of Betty Boop on internet. And that fascinated me.
The contextI don't know if I've already mentioned it, but over the past few months, I've developed a passion for the world of stuffed animals. I also took domestika* courses to learn how to make them: those of Efi Little Things and Lele Lerele.
As much as I loved Efi's Little Things class, Lele Lerele's class completely blew my mind! I really liked her clear and precise way of explaining things and her cute characters!
What I particularly like about these courses, is discovering the inspirations of the creators. It turns out that one of Elena from Lele Lerele's inspirations is Misako Mimoko brand; I appreciated her little world just as much.
Here is an example of what Misako Mimoko creates, isn’t that cute?
*domestika is an online platform that gives you the opportunity to take classes with your favorite creators. I've been using it for years. It is a very relevant learning tool whether you are self-taught, want to learn new techniques, or seek new inspiration.
What gave me so much emotions? After thinking a bit, I realized that the similar thing between Lele Lerele and Misako Mimoko is the eyes of their little dolls. That is what attracted me so much. I don't know why, but it really questioned me.
Searching for… the unknown eyesTo find out what was gave me this emotion, I started to draw characters in my sketchbook, with similar eyes. Here are examples of my creations that I digitally created .
I show you here some of my secret garden that I normally keep hidden. Please do not copy or reproduce them without my permission :)
Those eyes took me back to a memory. A “Madeleine de Proust”. After several days of drawing and redrawing characters, of thinking only about them, my brain unlocked itself. And finally gave me the answer: the animated cartoons of my childhood.
I finally (re)discovered those eyes again.
When I was little, I watched cartoons, especially those from Fleischer Studios. Maybe it doesn't mean anything to you, but if I say : Betty Boop, does it help a bit? It may seem vintage, but I think we've all watched this at one time or another, right?
So here’s how I came across Betty Boop.I remember when we were kids, my sister and I loved Betty Boop so much. Here is her incredible story :
Betty Boop is a female cartoon character, very sexy and charismatic, created in the 30’s by Grim Natwick, an illustrator, at the request of Fleischer Studios. She has a childish voice and sings the famous “boop-boop-a-doop!”. She wears a tight little black dress, very short, and a boyish haircut. She was first depicted as an anthropomorphic dog in an animated cartoon, with floppy dog ears.
Observing the popularity of this little woman, Fleischer studios decided to make her a central character, and to transform her into a human. Droopy dog ears become hoop earrings. This is the first sexy character that was invented in an animation studio. But the sexy part of the character somehow shocked the puritanical side of Americans at the time, and caused strong debates; leading studios to lengthen Betty Boop's dress to make her a little more “presentable” in the late 1930s.
But this charismatic little star doesn't came out of nowhere.And that’s what really surprised me.
She “would have” been inspired by a woman who really existed, whose name was Helen Kane. This story is quite known in the United States, much less abroad.
Helen Kane was an American actress and singer, a little star of the 30’s. In 1932, Miss Helen Kane filed a lawsuit against the Fleischer Studios (which she lost), for caricature exploiting her personality and image. Since that day, many believe that Betty Boop is a character which has been inspired from this woman.
In reality Helen Kane may not have originated this role.
In the 1920s and 30s, jazz culture was in expansion in the United States, and women singing some “Scat”* in tight outfits and pixie cuts were commonplace in this country. It was simply the fashion of the time. It is even said that Helen Kane saw the performance of Baby Esther, an African-American child star who performed in clubs of the time.
*What is Scat? It is a vocal singing technique in the Jazz community, which involves singing onomatopoeia with a fast rhythm. We all know the singer Scatman! But if you want to see a magnificent Scat battle performance, let’s see a video at the end of this article.
Back to Baby Esther. This young girl was popular for her childish voice (obviously : she was a child) and her Scat-like onomatopoeia. She has performed all over the world, even in France. Her story is fascinating. If you are interested about her story you can find links here and here.
Be careful, there are many fake stories and images about Baby Esther. As a teenager, she disappeared, so we have nothing about her as an adult, and we do not know what she became. She was a child star, famous worldwide at the time, and then she simply vanished!
This story has caused some debate in the United States recently, because... Helen Kane was white. And Baby Esther, African-American. It would therefore seem that Betty Boop, inspired by women in the jazz community of the time, as the Fleisher studio said, could have been drawn with darker skin.
To finish…
I find it very interesting to see how our inspirations can come and go, and how we must sometimes let it go to see where our inspirations lead us. How art can be connected to our childhood and our memories. These last days, I really feel the need to create only for myself. For this reason, I reconnected with my sketchbook, precious treasure, and my colored pencils.
When we create art, we create for numerous reasons: firstly it is a way of expressing ourselves, expressing what we have in us; but it is also in order to show our art, to flatter our ego, or to transmit something, to one's children, one's family... I therefore is a little surprised of keeping this only for myself, or those close to me, and this is something that I appreciate very much. I have the feeling of being less influenced by social media and thinking a little more deeply about my creative research.
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Well, that's all for today ! If you have read this far, I am extremely grateful, I know this article is very long, but I wanted it to be complete. Do not hesitate to comment or respond to me by e-mail if you wish to share your vision of things with me, I would be very happy ♡
To find the whole MimiWood world, you can find me on social media under @mimiwood_illustration, on Instagram, Facebook or my Etsy shop. You can also find all my articles on my substack page ‘This is the story of a French illustrator’.
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As a gift here is this little vintage song that everyone knows :)
As well as the magnificent Scat performance of Ella Fitzgerald and Mel Torme :
