Walter Pidgeon

Scottish artist George Gibson created the Film landscape that helped define the look of iconic films like The Wizard of Oz in the Golden age of Hollywood. Now His Family and hope that he will finally get the wider recognition he didn't receive at the time.

In The 1930S and 40s, Film scenes to be created on the indoor sound stages of teams, the scene painter, conjured up everything from city views to Rolling Hills .

movie studio Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) was one of the leading exponents of the art, all under the watchful eye of George Gibson .

He was The Head of the MGM Scenic Design Department for 30 years. The scenes he created appeared in films such as The Wizard of Oz (1939), " An American In Paris (1951) and Brigadoon (1954).

His scenes were not as large as 60ft x 150ft (18m by 45m), and so realistic that the viewer often, the setting was a stage.

Gibson was born in Edinburgh in 1904 and grew up in The Shadow of The Castle , later moving to Fochabers in Moray, when his father got a job as a Tailor .

worked led to His interest in drama at school, to discover to him his talent for painting a scene, and he returned to Edinburgh College of art to study, together with engineering.

He studied at the Glasgow School of Art with The Master scenic designer William E. Glover.

Gibson's daughter Jean says, her father had to work in the Grand theatre in London, but had difficulties to get a job, and so he decided to pack up and head to New York .

"The Day that he says sailed to America in 1930, his parents received a letter offering him a job in London," his daughter.

In an effort to find Better Weather and work In America , a friend convinced to move to Gibson, West to California , where he picked up odd jobs such as illustrated storyboard art at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

in 1938, he became head of the Scenic Design Department, where he helped build the MGM-scene-painting workshop, which was probably The Most beautiful in the country.

He convinced the studio to construct heads to a ground-breaking new building, where all the scenes could be painted centrally on the movable frame, instead of the solid frame, the sound of The Day .

One of The First films, Gibson worked on was The Wizard of Oz, one of The First movies in full Technicolor.

in These days, the visual effects would be digitally made, but in 1939 the whole world of Oz to be created by the use of supports and hand-painted landscape.

The production required three months of painting and was in total secrecy.

movie Fan Mark Cousins first came about Gibson when he was Director of the Edinburgh film festival in the 1990s.

He made was, that an Edinburgh man ended up painting some of The Most iconic images in cinema.

He says The Image of The City 's capital inspired his imagination in the drawing of the famous Emerald City .

Gibson's daughter, Jean Gibson-Gorrindo was not born until 1950, when her father was 46, you can't be sure of its influences.

But she does to him to think in a replica of the Sistine Chapel for the 1968 drama The Shoes of The Fishermen , about the election of a Pope.

"The Vatican said, 'you can't go, as she says, with its hot lights, and all the people, you'll ruin it'," she said.

"So My Father has an Emergency Call from Italy. She said: "George , we got to the Sistine Chapel . Did you paint it'.

"they painted it In Pieces , and sent it over to Italy, and you build it and filmed it and you could not tell they were in the Sistine Chapel . "

Jean was, and added: "My Father and mother attended the premiere of this film, and there were some Catholic bishops and cardinals behind them and he heard them say: "I thought I'd let you go film in the Chapel ." "

George retired a year later, but a Maltese at home, Every Day , until he died in the year 2001, at the age of 96 years.

As with many picturesque artist, he was never credited for his work.

"The studios don't want to say that you know that The Actors were standing in front of a painting," his daughter.

"you wanted to keep up The Illusion that they were outside. "

Two years ago, a Hollywood company,, the scenes from the heyday decided to cull his collection.

More Than 200 were rescued from the dump by the Art Directors Guild, the rolled out, photographed and cataloged, And Then set about finding homes for them.

Six of the backgrounds, including those that were donated by Madame Curie, the marked Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon , and The Washington Story , 1952, and at The Royal Conservatoire in Glasgow.

Jean is in the hope that as a result, her father could finally get the recognition he deserves.

Source of news: bbc.com