Google doodle goes bouncy; celebrates Art Clokey and Gumby

Search engine giant Google has come up with another fun and colourful Doodle this time around promising squishy fun in the home page. Featuring bouncy animated clay balls in the place of Google, the occasion is the 90th birth anniversary of 'Art' Clokey, a pioneer in the art of stop motion clay animation.

The doodle features the most prominent of Clokey's creations, the Gumby, a clay figure and star of the Gumby Show. The show was so popular that it ran for close to 35 years from Nov 1955. The doddle features various characters from Gumby doing spectacular animated poses after the user clicks in the respective clay balls.

In an apt tribute to Clokey, Google has come up with another bouncy doodle fun giving the artist true credit to his creative genius. The names of the characters featured in the Doodle are Gumby (the original clayboy), Pokey (Gumby's best friend and sidekick), the Blockheads ('J' and 'G' - the mischievous troublemakers), Tara (Gumby's girlfriend) and Prickle (Gumby's good friend).

Clokey was born on Oct 12, 1921 and his birth name was Arthur C Farrington. He died at the age of 88 on Jan 8, 2010. His first tryst with short clay animation films started off in the three minute short film Gumbasia (1953), that featured his most famous character Gumby. He slowly rose to fame later with his many other similar endeavours.

Google comes up with the timely doodles honouring artists, musicians and other famous personalities. Google Doodles have become so popular for their fun, interactive nature and never fails to impress users. They have also celebrated news events, civic milestones, birthdays, death anniversaries and dates of historic importance with equal fanfare.

OneIndia News