A collection of rare drawings by John Lennon, rediscovered at auction, has gone on display at The Liverpool Beatles Museum on Mathew Street.

Joseph Robert O’Donnell, a Beatles collector and dealer based in Tynemouth, uncovered the drawings at a London auction house, where they had gone largely unnoticed. Recognising their historical significance, he acquired them for his collection before offering them for exhibition at The Liverpool Beatles Museum.

The drawings, created by Stephen Verona and John Lennon, contained the complete lyrics to The Beatles’ song ‘I Feel Fine’, with each word and illustration appearing on its own piece of paper. The 240 drawings, or ‘cells’, were then used to create a short animated film, forming what many regard as one of the earliest music videos, decades before the term was coined.

Stephen later recalled in an interview: “I met John Lennon in London while directing a commercial. We started doodling drawings on a table, and I suggested making a film from them. That became The Beatles’ first animated music video – ‘I Feel Fine’. It was two minutes long, made from 240 drawings.”

The commercial, for Ford Motor Company, featured a model portraying Lady Godiva on horseback being overtaken by a Ford Cortina. Following filming, Stephen took the model to a London club, where she introduced him to actor Victor Spinetti, who in turn introduced him to John and Cynthia Lennon. John was doodling on a paper tablecloth and Stephen joined in. It was at this point that Stephen suggested making a film from the drawings and John agreed.

Stephen then returned home and began producing bold pop-art cartoon images designed to fit the lyrics and follow the rhythm of the music. John later visited Stephen’s Manhattan apartment, where Stephen recalled the pair spending hours seated side by side at the kitchen table, smoking and hand-colouring the drawings with felt-tip markers to complete the animation cells for what has since been described as a pioneering rock music video.

The finished film was an immediate success. It was screened at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, won awards at the Atlanta, San Francisco and Chicago film festivals, received the prestigious CINE Golden Eagle Award and subsequently toured major international film festivals, cementing its place in both music and visual culture history. Stephen later went on to create music videos for Barbra Streisand, Santana and Chicago.

In 2000, Stephen consigned the complete set of 240 original animation drawings to Christie’s New York, where they sold for $58,750 before being separated and dispersed around the world.

Now reunited, four of the original drawings are on display in Liverpool. Two form lyrical sequences reading ‘Baby Says She’s Mine’ and ‘In Love With Her’ – instantly recognisable lines from ‘I Feel Fine’ – while two additional standalone drawings feature the words ‘And’ and ‘I’.

The artworks were unveiled at The Liverpool Beatles Museum, 23 Mathew Street, on 4 June before an invited audience of Beatles enthusiasts and will now remain on public display for several months.

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