Russell Singler

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licensing profile

and end all and I still don’t, but it is avery important tool of the job.”

In fact the web is part of a very pro-active marketing package: “We’venever just sat there sipping our fizzywater. We are all about buildingrelationships, we phone, we email, wemail, we put on fun events and wealways do follow up.”

For a gallery that works hard atdeveloping long-term relationships,perhaps it is surprising that after aneight month analysis of website hits,85% of purchases are new customers.On the other hand, perhaps it’s justanother very good reason for everygallery in the industry to run an up-to-date website in tandem with theirgallery, to capture both new and long-standing customers.

The often repeated view thatlicensed art is somehow demeaning tothe artist really doesn’t stick with thegalleries approach to developing art forpublishing. Many of the artists thatRussell is working with are highlyrespected fine artists who just happento paint or draw Superman andThomas the Tank Engine rather thanflorals and landscapes and theiroriginals are selling for tens ofthousands of pounds.

The fact that Russell works withsome extraordinarily talented artists is

People like to buy from people,”says Russell Singler, right at thebeginning of our interview. This

might sound like an obvious thing tosay, but it is a mantra that has held TheAnimation Art Gallery’s leading positionin licensed and animation art.

Russell says you don’t have to be anintellectual giant or even the owner ofsome intellectual property to work thisphilosophy out. “People want to eitherbuy from a gallery that they like andtrust or buy from an artist that they likeand trust. It’s that simple, that is theformula we have followed all the waythrough.”

He has a great memory forremembering who has bought what. “Inever want customers to say ‘It’s OK’,because I feel so passionate aboutwhat I sell.”

The Animation Art Gallery, in GreatCastle Street, London is undoubtedlywhat you’d call prime retailing, just onestreet off the shopping Mecca ofOxford Street.

But prime sites equal hugeoverheads and Russell has had tomake some pretty tough businessdecisions over the years. Having setup the business 11 years ago with twopartners, after rising through the ranksof the Disney stores and then workingin a North London gallery, Russell hasbought both partners out and is nowsailing the ship alone. He has alsorefocused the workforce to a motivatedand tight team.

“This place is a monster and it doessoak up resources. You have got to gothrough the journey – there are noshort cuts. Some people can make itand some people get eaten alive. I’mlooking to open more galleries, acquiremore licensed properties and reallywork the wholesale side, the retail andthe web.”

Russell believes at the heart of beinga successful retail gallery is the abilityto flex and adapt. “The minute you getcosy – that’s when you should feelnervous, you’ve got to be open tochange and keep flexing, otherwiseyou will get set and unable to adaptand grow.”

Russell has had a website from dayone of the business. In the early days,he found the biggest challenge wasjust telling people how to turn on theircomputers! “I never saw it as the be all

“People liketo buy from

people” It’s not very often we get to live out our childhood

fantasies in real life, but that (it appears) is just

what Russell Singler has done. As the owner and

brains behind The Animation Art Gallery –

Europe’s original animation art specialists, and

the publishing company Flip Editions, Russell has

converted his childhood love affair with cartoons

and comic books into a licensed art gallery and

publishing company that is attracting worldwide

collectors to its door. Sarah Orton reports

Spiderman in the rain by John Romita

“

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draws the gallery visitor into everypiece of art, from which they can gleana fascinating fact about who created it,how it was created and why.

The basement level was untilrecently given over to a framingdepartment, but Russell has tuned intothe huge retail potential of this space.He still offers a framing service, butuses “fantastic” off-site contractframers. The gallery has also investedin state-of-the-art technology to createlimited editions for both the gallery andFlip Editions.

Russell quickly realised thecomplications of running a publishingcompany alongside the retail operationand appointed a distributor withexcellent worldwide distribution for allof Flip Editions’ products. They alreadyhave an established network of 4,000wholesale buyers in the art and gift

markets and Russell said it madesense to spend the company’smarketing budget in other areas thisyear.

The fundamental principal of ‘buy apiece of art because you love it’ is akey mantra: “We have lots of long termloyal customers who have bought fromus and now realise that they havesomething really valuable. But I stillthink customers should buy the artbecause they love it first and as aninvestment second.”

A stunning image of Spiderman inthe Rain by John Romita is a greatexample.

The Animation Art Gallery sold 55 ofa 99 edition published by a licensee inthe States. They were first sold in thegallery for £600 framed, but by the lastten the gallery was selling them for£1,500. Now it’s on the wall for £3,500and on the secondary market theimage has fetched £5,000.

“We just knew this image was faband we will tell our customers if webelieve the art has an ‘appreciativevalue’. But we still tell people to buysomething that they love! That is ourstrength as a gallery. We are notinterested in merchandise, we are notinterested in ‘not bad’ images, we wantto offer some really knock out stuff.”

Paul Mellia ‘Artist to the stars’ hasbeen another enormous success storywith Thomas at the station selling for£29,000.

The gallery still does very well withthe original cels and drawings fromDisney and vintage Warner Bros (thethings that Russell says “made usfamous”) but now they have created awhole genre of art that can feed thenostalgia. (Continued over)

no coincidence as he has developedcontacts with all the big hitters inlicensing, securing some impressiveworldwide licensing deals.

If you take one of his hugelysuccessful artists Steve Kaufman – oneof Warhol’s main assistants – thepedigree is there. He sells $11 milliondollars worth of his originals a year andThe Animation Art Gallery looks afterhim in the UK.

Unlike other galleries, who aretalking about genres and explainingthe difference between impressionismand abstract, the education process atThe Animation Art Gallery is in the typeof art and the artists behind the work,not in the characters themselves.

Bugs Bunny, Thomas the TankEngine, Superman and Mickey Mouse– need little introduction, but the artistsand the process behind the creation ofthe art does. As well as the limitededition giclée versus originalsmessage, Russell needs to know thathis staff can talk confidently about thekey processes of producing animationartwork that might be sold in thegallery – be it original production cels,limited edition cels and serigraphs orsericels.

A staggeringly simple marketingtechnique, but one which is oftenmissed in the gallery environment, isevery piece of art is hung with a neatlittle synopsis alongside. This helps tocreate ‘a story’ around each piece and

Kaufman launch party packs the gallery

Thomas at the station

Hello Kitty

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One of those is a worldwide deal for theartwork of Hello Kitty: “It’s the first time thisincredible icon has ever been offered asartwork and we’ll be offering images from1974 onwards. I’m really excited about it,especially as it’s a worldwide deal.”

In addition to the imminent launch ofartwork of Peppa Pig, this summer will seethe gallery going up a gear again when it isthe official sponsor of the Artists’ Alley at theStar Wars Celebration Europe event in Julyat ExceL in London. The gallery has ‘somereally big plans’ and plans to work withmovie poster master John Alvin and StarWars artist Lawrence Noble.

Under license with ChapmanEntertainment, the company has justlaunched the Fifi and the Flowertots officialart programme, with The Animation ArtGallery publishing signed and small editionsizes of 25 worldwide.

Russell is also onto the Monsterism.netphenomenon and plans to work with theartist Pete Fowler this year, appealing to thehuge community of people who collect vinylmonsters and visit the play lounge onCarnaby Street.

So how does Russell select a newlylicensed publishing programme? “Selfishreasons mainly!” he grins, “I just go for stuffI like. I’ve grown up loving certain charactersand stories and then it hits me – why isn’tthere any artwork for this?” Indeed, thecompany’s trademark strap line is ‘Artworkyou grew up with’.

Russell says the Mr Men launch was agood example of this. It occurred to Russellwhen he was reading a Mr Greedy book tohis children that the giant’s plate, with thesausages, peas and potatoes would make agreat picture. “I felt all tingly, knowing itwould be a great piece…” four years laterand having gone through CPLG and Corianthe deal was done. The initial Mr Men seriesincluded five book scenes and the businessis now launching another ten.

Boundless energy and an incredibleknowledge of the licensing market couldnever be enough to persuade some of the

biggest global brands to give permissionto produce an art programme, so howdoes Russell do it?

“It’s a two way street and in their caseit’s not totally about dollars. They wantour product because it adds weight totheir global multi-million dollar brand. Weprovide an angle that they can’tnecessarily create themselves.”

And unless you can afford to fight avery expensive lawsuit, Russell believesartists and publishers should not hidebehind the ‘artistic interpretation’ label.“It’s about responsible actions, itsignposts legitimacy. A licensee shouldbe in a favourable position because theyknow how to ‘tow the line’ and ‘do thingsby the book’, there is a great comfort inthat. If you haven’t signed up to anythingand are ‘winging it’ you’ve just got tohope all the time that you are going to getaway with it.”

Over the last ten years, brand ownershave woken up more than ever before tothe fact that there is money in licensingtheir brand and brand owners are keenerthan ever to find partners with integrity.“There has been a real shift for a lot of thebrand owners. They want partners whoare championing the brand rather thanjust making money out of it and ‘doingtheir own thing’. Everything I do has to bewith the brand owners support.”

The great thing about having the retailand wholesale side is we have a veryclear picture of what is and isn’t workingand selling at retail level. “While it is cakeand eating it – it means we can offersupport and education at the wholesalelevel.”

Although you know a lot of blood,sweat and tears has gone into buildingThe Animation Art Gallery and FlipEditions, Russell quickly relaxes back into‘big kid’ mode as we reach the end of theinterview: “I spent my childhood watchingcartoons, playing games and readingcomic books and have made a businessout of it. Selfishly it’s surrounding myselfwith stuff I love. I just get a real kick out ofselling what I sell!”

And just like the Tom Hanks characterin Big, Russell is strangely happy to viewlife through an adult’s and child’s eyes. ■

The big eventRussell is a huge believer in the ‘retailexperience’. But this is not somesuperficial American retail experience –he simply believes in matching newanimation art launches with animatedgallery events. “We are particularly proudof our special events and have run morethan 40 in a decade.”

The latest spectacle was a ‘Meet thecreators of Mr Benn’ evening at the endof February, which saw joint creatorsDavid McKee and Rollo Films founderClive Juster signing a new collection ofMr Benn artwork. As with all the specialevents the evening was accompanied byfree-flowing drinks and a ‘linked theme’ –an opportunity for guests to dress up andbe photographed in a Mr Benn costume.

The ‘one that they are still talkingabout’ saw the gallery with bars at thewindow, the Rock n Roll House Banddressed in stripy prison gear, with beerand pizza from the restaurant next door tolaunch the official ‘Graceland’ artist JoePetruccio.

The Thomas & Friends art programmelaunch saw The Fat Controller reading hisfavourite Thomas & Friends stories withPaul Mellia signing his commemorativelimited editions and his incredible Thomasat the station original canvas displayed inthe window.

Wallace & Gromit have also seenappearances and signings by the originalcreators, Nick Park, Peter Lord and PeterSallis.

The Mr Men art programme included aQ & A with Adam Hargreaves (Roger’sson) and the appearance of some giantsized Mr Men characters. The nine weekshow attracted up to 400 people a day. Itfeatured a big memorabilia collection ondisplay, some fascinating story boardsabout the characters and the wholeexperience moved some of the visitors totears – as they re-lived their childhoodmemories of the Mr Men.

This year is going to be ‘a big one’ forThe Animation Art Gallery as the companyhas signed a number of deals for artworkthat haven’t yet achieved art programmes.

David McKee (right), the artist behind Mr Benn

Steve Box and Nick Park signing at the launch

Mr Men launch with appearance of AdamHargreaves and characters