APPROACH

Barks once commented on the ducks' overall looks in his Disney paintings: I'm going to do away with the outline on the ducks. They won't look like colored cartoons; I'm going to see if I can't make them look like real, round ducks. I wouldn't draw outlines if I was painting a bunch of sailors - I would draw them with colors. And I did that with the ducks.
I was experimenting with ways to take those white ducks and make them look round. I gave them a shadowed side and a lighted side, and still I had the same problem: They are little devils to paint. It was hard to put personality into their shape, which was basically that of a round ball.
Barks' wife Garé told a story of when he first wanted to start painting the ducks: He got out a Ping-Pong ball, attached a string to it, and studied it under different lighting conditions to figure out how shadows looked on a sphere. It was from studying that Ping-Pong ball that he finally learned how to shade the heads of the ducks. That's the way he approached everything.

Almost all of Barks' duck paintings are made on Masonite, which ensures that a large number of details can be added due to its very smooth surface. As for paint and brushes Barks said (excerpted from several interviews): I prefer to paint in oil - Acrylics dry too fast - With oil you can go back after three to four hours - With acrylics you get color variations - I use small brushes for coins, bills, and buttons - Oil makes the coins look lush.

Although Barks did not have a say when it came to the colouring of his comics, he was always very fond of bright and strong colours. He actually felt that the special colouring in the Disney cartoons greatly contributed to their success, and he tried very hard to incorporate the same type of colouring in his paintings. But, according to himself, he was never entirely satisfied with his results.

COMPOSITION

Barks never started on the board that would eventually wind up as the finished painting. He always did a great number of 'feeling around' sketches (as he called them) when creating his paintings. In this preliminary work stage he experimented heavily with expressions, details, three-dimensional means, light settings, and colours, as well as the optimal placement of characters, different poses, objects, and backgrounds. In that way, a simple preliminary painting would be repainted over and over until Barks was finally satisfied. Then he started on the real painting!

Barks: Behind every situation is a good idea. In general, I use key situations from my old comic stories. I start by producing many, many sketches in different perspectives. Usually I have to make four or five layouts before I have one that I like. I then transfer the ducks to transparent paper and push them around on the layout until they are at the right spot. In that manner the layout develops piece by piece.

Below is a selection of the numerous sketches on different levels of completion for An Embarrassment of Riches. Notice the diverse ideas Barks dreamed up, many of which did not survive through the advancing stages.
 

PAINTING

The paintings of the interior of Scrooge's Money Bin have always been the collectors' favourites because of their numerous details. Barks usually added either funny gizmos such as special book titles, or artifacts from his stories in the 23 Money Bin paintings, but the endless amounts of coins may be considered the most impressive element. Barks paid great attention to the coins; he worked hard to give them just the perfect gold colours, and many of them were extremely detailed. For this purpose Barks would use brushes with only one hair!!!

Barks: Of all my paintings (Barks is talking of the paintings that were made for lithographs between 1981 and 1997 - Editor's remark) I got the most satisfaction out of An Embarrassment of Riches. The pleasure came mostly in the refinement of the color. I certainly didn't paint the coins any better than I had in other paintings, nor did I paint the ducks any better. The composition was touch and go; I felt that the first version I did was better than the final one.
I had to make the composition as I finally produced it in order to fit so many different elements into the picture. It was like a painting that was set up and approved by a committee.
I was alone in my concept of the subject matter, and I could see where I had done a few things that could be improved of very greatly, so I let the opinions of the others lead me into making changes, and finally I got something that sort of pleased everybody.
I like details in my paintings. I use the smallest brush to emphasize the smallest details. That's why I don't use canvas as much as Masonite which has a very smooth surface.
Money doesn't just stack up like grains of wheat. They have these flat surfaces. It's like having a whole pile of cookies, and they kind of slide around on top of each other.
Painting becomes quite tiresome. But it is something that I know I can do if I just have the time. I can just sit and paint those coins by the thousands, year after year.

AFTERMATH

The painting was finished in May 1983 and received #125 in Barks' own numbering system. The title is An Embarrassment of Riches, which is an idiom meaning 'an abundance of so many good things, that it is impossible to choose the ones you want'. The work was intended for use in a new lithograph series (it became the second painting) and was reproduced in 395 copies all numbered and signed by Barks.

The original painting was sold for 20,000 dollars in 3 installments over the next 3 months (indicating how expensive it was at the time), and Barks earned an additional 13,737.38 dollars from the lithographs. A satisfied Barks later said: I finally got all the lighting exactly as I wanted for that painting.