Dell Comics Cover Artist: Ernest Nordli

Born in Salt Lake City in 1912 to Norwegian immigrant parents, Ernest Nordli is best know as an animation designer and layout artist for the best in the business, Walt Disney Studios. Staring with the company in 1936 he served as art director and layout artist on their classic features Dumbo and Fantasia as he also worked on many of the studio's Donald Duck shorts through the mid-1940s. Leaving Disney in the 1950s, "Ernie" as he was called by his friends, worked as a layout artist for some of Chuck Jones finest cartoons. About this same time Nordli did freelance work for Dell Publishing, painting beautiful rendered watercolor Western covers such as Red Ryder Comics #138 and The Cisco Kid #25, both from 1955, shown here for your enjoyment. Finding more full time employment with Walt Disney Studios, Ernest worked on more memorable Disney  features such as Sleeping Beauty and played an important role in the designs of One Hundred and One Dalmatians. Always in demand for his design talent, the artist continued to work on numerous movie and television properties until his sudden death at the young age of fifty-five in April of 1968.