Jean Giraud

Jean Giraud

Giraud at the International Festival of Comics in Łódź, October 2008
Born Jean Henri Gaston Giraud
(1938-05-08)8 May 1938
Nogent-sur-Marne, France
Died 10 March 2012(2012-03-10) (aged 73)
Paris, France
Nationality French
Area(s) Writer, Artist
Pseudonym(s) Gir, Mœbius, Jean Gir
Notable works
Collaborators Alejandro Jodorowsky, Jean-Michel Charlier
Awards full list
Spouse(s) Claudine Conin (m. 1967–94)
Isabelle Champeval (m. 1995–2012)
Children Hélène Giraud (1970), Julien Giraud (1972), Raphaël Giraud (1989), Nausicaa Giraud (1995)
Signature
Signature of Jean Giraud
moebius.fr

Jean Henri Gaston Giraud (French: [ʒiʁo]; 8 May 1938 – 10 March 2012) was a French artist, cartoonist and writer who worked in the Franco-Belgian bandes dessinées (BD) tradition. Giraud garnered worldwide acclaim predominantly under the pseudonym Mœbius (/ˈmoʊbiəs/;[1] French: [məbjys]) and to a lesser extent Gir (French: [ʒiʁ]), which he used for the Blueberry series and his Western themed paintings. Esteemed by Federico Fellini, Stan Lee and Hayao Miyazaki among others,[2] he has been described as the most influential bandes dessinées artist after Hergé.[3]

His most famous works include the series Blueberry, created with writer Jean-Michel Charlier, featuring one of the first anti-heroes in Western comics. As Mœbius he created a wide range of science fiction and fantasy comics in a highly imaginative, surreal, almost abstract style. These works include Arzach and the Airtight Garage of Jerry Cornelius. He also collaborated with avant-garde filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky for an unproduced adaptation of Dune and the comic book series The Incal.

Mœbius also contributed storyboards and concept designs to numerous science fiction and fantasy films, such as Alien, Tron, The Fifth Element and The Abyss. Blueberry was adapted for the screen in 2004 by French director Jan Kounen.

Early life

Jean Giraud was born in Nogent-sur-Marne, Val-de-Marne, in the suburbs of Paris, on 8 May 1938,[4][5] as the only child to Raymond Giraud, an insurance agent, and Pauline Vinchon who had worked at the agency.[6] When he was three years old, his parents divorced and he was raised mainly by his grandparents, who were living in the neighboring municipality of Fontenay-sous-Bois (much later, when he was the acclaimed artist, Giraud returned to live in the municipality in the mid-1970s, but was regrettably unable to buy his grandparents' house[7]). The rupture between mother and father created a lasting trauma that he explained lay at the heart of his choice of separate pen names.[8] An introverted child at first, young Giraud found solace after World War II in a small theater, located on a corner in the street where his mother lived, which concurrently provided an escape from the dreary atmosphere in post-war reconstruction era France.[9] Playing an abundance of American B-Westerns, it was there that Giraud, frequenting the theater as often as he was able to, developed a passion for the genre, as had so many other European boys his age in those times.[7]

At age 9-10 Giraud started to draw Western comics while enrolled by his single mother as a stop-gap measure in the Saint-Nicolas boarding school in Issy-les-Moulineaux for two years (and where he became acquainted with Belgian comic magazines like Spirou and Tintin), much to the amusement of his school mates.[10] In 1954, at age 16,[11] he began his only technical training at the École Supérieure des Arts Appliqués Duperré, where he, unsurprisingly, started producing Western comics, which however did not sit well with his teachers.[12] At the college, he befriended other future comic artists, Jean-Claude Mézières and fr:Pat Mallet. With Mézières in particular, in no small part due to their shared passion for science fiction, Westerns and the Far West, Giraud developed a close lifelong friendship,[13] calling him a "continuing life's adventure" in later life.[14] In 1956 he left art school without graduating to visit his mother, who had married a Mexican in Mexico, and stayed there for nine months.

It was the experience of the Mexican desert, in particular its endless blue skies and unending flat plains, now seeing and experiencing for himself the vistas that had enthralled him so much when watching westerns on the silver screen only a few years earlier, which left an everlasting, "quelque chose qui m'a littéralement craqué l'âme",[15] enduring impression on him, easily recognizable in almost all of his later seminal works.[15] After his return to France, he started to work as a full-time tenured artist for Catholic publisher Fleurus, to whom he was introduced by Mézières, who had shortly before found employment at the publisher.[16][10] In 1959–1960 he was slated for military service in, firstly the French occupation zone of Germany, and subsequently Algeria,[17] in the throes of the vicious Algerian War at the time. Fortunately for him however, he somehow managed to escape frontline duty as he – being the only service man available at the time with a graphics background – served out his military obligations as illustrator on the army magazine 5/5 Forces Françaises, besides being assigned to logistic duties.[7]

Career

Western comics

At 18, Giraud was drawing his own humorous, Morris inspired, Western comic two-page shorts, Frank et Jeremie, for the magazine Far West, his very first free-lance commercial sales.[18] Magazine editor Marijac thought young Giraud gifted with a knack for humorous comics, but none whatsoever for realistically drawn comics, and advised him to continue in the vein of Frank et Jeremie.[10]

Fleurus (1956-1958)

A panel from Giraud's 1958 Western comic "King of the Buffalo", written by Noel Carré. It shows heavy inspiration from Jijé.

Tenured at publisher Fleurus from 1956 to 1958 after his first sales, Giraud did so, but concurrently continued to steadfastly create realistically drawn Western comics (alongside several others of a French historical nature) and illustrations for magazine editorials in their magazines Fripounet et Marisette, fr:Cœurs Valiants and Ames Valliantes – all of them of a strong edifying nature aimed at France's adolescent youth – , up to a point that his realistically drawn comics had become his mainstay. Among his realistic Westerns was a comic called "Le roi des bisons" ("King of the Buffalo" – has seen an English publication[16]), and another called "Un géant chez lez Hurons" ("A Giant with the Hurons").[19] Actually, several of his Western comics, including "King of the Buffalo", featured the same protagonist Art Howell, and these can be considered as Giraud's de facto first realistic Western series, as he himself did in effect, since he, save the first one, endowed these stories with the subtitle "Un aventure d'Art Howell".[20] It was for Fleurus that Giraud also illustrated his first three books.[21] Already in this period his style was heavily influenced by his later mentor, Belgian comic artist Joseph "Jijé" Gillain, who at that time was the major source of inspiration for an entire generation of young aspiring French comic artists, including Giraud's friend Mézières, interested in doing realistically drawn comics.[16] How major Jijé's influence was on these young artists, was amply demonstrated by the Fleurus publications these youngsters submitted their work to, as their work strongly resembled each other. For example, two of the books Giraud illustrated for Fleurus, were co-illustrated with Guy Mouminoux, another name of some future renown in the Franco-Belgian comic world, and Giraud's work can only be identified, because he signed his work, whereas Mouminoux did not sign his. While not ample, Giraud's earning at Fleurus were just enough to allow him – disenchanted as he was with the courses, prevalent atmosphere and academic discipline – to quit his art academy education after only two years, though he came to somewhat regret the decision in later life.[22]

Jijé apprenticeship (1961-1962)

Shortly before he entered military service, Giraud visited his idol at his home for the first time with Mézières and Mallet, followed by a few visits on his own to see the master at work for himself. In 1961, returning from military service and his stint on 5/5 Forces Françaises, Giraud, not wanting to return to Fleurus as he felt that he "had to do something else, if he ever wanted to evolve", became an apprentice of Jijé on his invitation, after he saw that Giraud had made artistic progress during his stay at 5/5 Forces Françaises.[23] Jijé was then one of the leading comic artists in Europe and known for his gracious tendency to voluntarily act as a mentor for young, aspiring comic artists, of which Giraud was only one, going even as far as opening up his family home in Champrosay for days on end for these youngsters, which, again, included Giraud.[24] In this Jijé resembled Belgian comic grand-master Hergé, but unlike Jijé, Hergé only did so on a purely commercial basis, never on a voluntarily one. For Jijé, Giraud created several other shorts and illustrations for the short-lived magazine Bonux-Boy (1960/61), his first comic work after military service, and his penultimate one before embarking on Blueberry.[25] In this period, Jijé used his apprentice for the inks on an outing of his Western series Jerry Spring – after whom Giraud had, unsurprisingly, modeled his Art Howell character previously – , "The Road to Coronado", which Giraud inked.[17] Actually, Jijé had intended his promising pupil for the entirety of the story art, but the still unexperienced Giraud, used as he was to work under the relaxed conditions at Fleurus, found himself overwhelmed by the strict time schedules a production for a periodical (Spirou in this case) demanded. Conceding that he had been a bit too cocky and ambitious, Giraud stated, "I started the story all by myself. But after a week I had only finished half a plate, and, aside from being soaked with my sweat, it was a complete disaster. So Joseph went on to do the penciling, whereas I did the inks."[10] Even though Giraud did loose touch with his mentor eventually, he has never forgotten what "his master" had provided him with, both "aesthetically and professionally",[26] the fatherless Giraud gratefully stating in later life, "It was as if he had asked me «Do you want me to be your father?», and if by a miracle, I was provided with one, a[n] [comic] artist no less!".[24]

Hachette (1962-1963)

Pursuant his stint at Jijé's, Giraud was again approached by friend Mézières if he was interested to work alongside him as an illustrator on Hachette's ambitious multi-volume L'histoire des civilisations history reference work.[27] Spurred on by Jijé, who considered the opportunity a wonderful one for his pupil, Giraud accepted. Though he considered the assignment a daunting one, having to recreate imaginary in oil paints from historical objects and imagery, it, besides being the best paying job he had until then held, was nonetheless a seminal appointment.[24] At Hachette Giraud discovered that he had a knack for creating art in gouaches, something that served him well not that much later when creating Blueberry magazine/album cover art,[28] as well as for his 1968 side-project Buffalo Bill: le roi des éclaireurs history book written by fr:George Fronval, for whom Giraud provided two-thirds of the illustrations in gouache, including the cover.[29] The assignment at Hachette being cut short because of his invitation to embark on Fort Navajo, meant he only participated on the first three to four volumes of the book series, leaving the completion to Mézières. In the Pilote era, Giraud additionally provided art in gouache for two Western themed vinyl record music productions as sleeve art,[30] as well as the covers for the first seven outings in the French language edition of the Morgan Kane Western novel series written by Louis Masterson.[31] Much of his Western-themed gouache artwork of this era, including that of Blueberry, has been collected in the 1983 artbook "Le tireur solitaire".[32]

Aside for its professional importance, Giraud's stint at Hachette also turned out to be of personal importance as well, as he met Claudine Conin, an editorial researcher at Hachette, and who described her future husband as being at the time "funny, uncomplicated, friendly, a nice boy next-door", but on the other hand "mysterious, dark, intellectual", already recognizing that he had all the makings of a "visionary", long before others did.[33] Married in 1967, after Giraud had become the recognized Blueberry artist, the couple had two children, Hélène (b:1970) and Julien (b:1972). Daughter Hélène in particular seemed to have inherited her father's graphics talents as she too has carved out a career as a graphics artist in the animation industry,[34] earning her a 2014 French civilian knighthood, the same her father had already received in 1985. Besides raising their children, wife Claudine not only took care of the business aspects of her husband's art work, but has on occasion also contributed to it as well as colorist.[35] The 1976 feminist fantasy short story, "La tarte aux pommes",[36] was written by her under her maiden name. Additionally, the appearance of a later, major character in Giraud's Blueberry series, Chihuahua Pearl, was in part based on Claudine's looks.[37] The Mœbiusienne 1973 fantasy road trip short story "La déviation",[38] created as "Gir"[39] before the artist fully embarked on his Mœbius career, featured the Giraud family as the protagonists, save Julien.

Pilote (1963-1979)

In October 1963, Giraud and writer Jean-Michel Charlier started the comic strip Fort Navajo for the by Charlier co-founded Pilote magazine, issue 210.[40] At this time the affinity between the styles of Giraud and Jijé (who in effect had been Charlier's first choice for the series, but who was reverted to Giraud by Jijé) was so close that Jijé penciled several pages for the series when Giraud went AWOL. In effect, when "Fort Navajo" started its run, Pilote received angry letters, accusing Giraud of plagiarism, which was however foreseen by Jijé and Giraud. Shirking off the accusations, Jijé encouraged his former pupil to stay the course instead, thereby propping up his self-confidence.[24] The first time Jijé had to fill in for Giraud, was during the production of the second story, "Thunder in the West" (1964), when the still inexperienced Giraud, buckling under the stress of having to produce a strictly scheduled magazine serial, suffered from a nervous breakdown, with Jijé taking on plates 28–36.[41] The second time occurred one year later, during the production of "Mission to Mexico (The Lost Rider)", when Giraud unexpectedly packed up and left to travel the United States,[42] and, again, Mexico; yet again former mentor Jijé came to the rescue by penciling plates 17–38.[43][44] While the art style of both artists had been nearly indistinguishable from each other in "Thunder in the West", after Giraud resumed work on plate 39 of "Mission to Mexico", a clearly noticeable style breach was now observable, indicating that Giraud was now well on his way to develop his own signature style, eventually surpassing that of his former teacher Jijé, who, impressed by his former pupil's achievements, has later coined him the "Rimbaud de la BD".[24]

Blueberry, created by Giraud and writer Jean-Michel Charlier. Within the series, he turned from the classic Western comic to a grittier realism.

The Lieutenant Blueberry character, whose facial features were based on those of the actor Jean-Paul Belmondo, was created in 1963 by Charlier (scenario) and Giraud (drawings) for Pilote.[45][46] While the Fort Navajo series had originally been intended as an ensemble narrative, it quickly gravitated towards having Blueberry as its central figure. His featured adventures, in what was later called the Blueberry series, may be Giraud's best known work in native France and the rest of Europe, before later collaborations with Alejandro Jodorowsky. The early Blueberry comics used a simple line drawing style similar to that of Jijé, and standard Western themes and imagery (specifically, those of John Ford's US Cavalry Western trilogy, with Howard Hawk's 1959 Rio Bravo thrown in for good measure for the sixth, one-shot title "The Man with the Silver Star"), but gradually Giraud developed a darker and grittier style inspired by, firstly the 1970 Westerns Soldier Blue and Little Big Man (for the "Iron Horse" story-arc), and subsequently by the Spaghetti Westerns of Sergio Leone and the dark realism of Sam Peckinpah in particular (for the "Lost Goldmine" story-arc and beyond).[47] With the fifth album, "The Trail of the Navajos", Giraud established his own style, and after both editorial control and censorship laws were loosened in the wake of the May 1968 social upheaval in France – the former in no small part due to the revolt key comic artists, Giraud chief among them, staged a short time thereafter in the editorial offices of Dargaud, the publisher of Pilote, demanding and ultimately receiving more creative freedom from editor-in-chief René Goscinny[lower-alpha 1] – , the strip became more explicitly adult, and also adopted a wider range of thematics.[3][44] The first Blueberry album penciled by Giraud after he had begun publishing science fiction as Mœbius, "Nez Cassé" ("Broken Nose"), was much more experimental than his previous Western work.[44] While the editorial revolt at Dargaud has effectively become the starting point of the emancipation of the French comic world,[49] Giraud has admitted that it had also caused a severe breach in his hitherto warm relationship with the conservative Goscinny, and which was has never been fully mended.[50]

Giraud left the series and publisher in 1974, partly because he was tired of the publication pressure he was under in order to produce the series, partly because of an emerging royalties conflict, but mostly because he wanted further explore and develop his "Mœbius" alter ego, in particular because Jodorowsky, who was impressed by the graphic qualities of Blueberry, had already invited him to come over to Los Angeles previously, to start production design on his Dune movie project, and which constituted the first Jodorowsky/Mœbius collaboration. Giraud was so eager to return on the project during a stopover from the United States while the project was in hiatus, that he greatly accelerated the work on the "Angel Face" outing of Blueberry he was working on at the time, shearing off weeks from its originally intended completion.[51] The project fell through though, and after he had returned definitely to France later that year, he started to produce comic work under this pseudonym that was published in the magazine he co-founded, Métal Hurlant, which started its run in December 1974 and revolutionized the Franco-Belgian comic world in the process. He returned to the series in 1979 with "Nez Cassé" as a free-lancer.

It was Jodorowsky who introduced Giraud to the writings of Carlos Castaneda, who had written a series of books that describe his training in shamanism, particularly with a group whose lineage descended from the Toltecs. The books, narrated in the first person, related his experiences under the tutelage of a Yaqui "Man of Knowledge" named Don Juan Matus. Castaneda's writings made a deep and everlasting impression on Giraud, already open to Native-Mexican folk culture due to his three previous extended trips to the country (he had visited the country a third time in 1972[52]), and it did influence his art as "Mœbius", particularly in regard to dream sequences, though he was not quite able to work in such influences in his mainstream Blueberry comic.[lower-alpha 2][54] Yet, unbeknownst to writer Charlier, he did already sneak in some Castaneda elements in "Nez Cassé".[55] Castaneda's influence reasserted itself in full in Giraud's later life, having worked in elements more openly after Charlier's death in his 1999 Blueberry outing "Geronimo l'Apache", and was to become a major element for his Blueberry 1900-project, which however, had refused to come to fruition for extraneous reasons.[56][57]

Even though Giraud had vainly tried to introduce his Blueberry co-worker to the writings of Castaneda, Charlier, being of a previous generation, conservative in nature and wary of science fiction in general, has never understood what his younger colleague tried to achieve as "Mœbius". Nonetheless, he never tried to hinder Giraud in the least, as he understood that an artist of Giraud's caliber needed a "mental shower" from time to time. Furthermore, Charlier was very appreciative of the graphic innovations Giraud ported over from his work as "Mœbius" into the mainstream Blueberry series, most specifically "Nez Cassé", making him "one of the all-time greatest artists in the comic medium", as Charlier himself worded it in 1982.[58] Artist fr:Michel Rouge, who was taken on by Giraud in 1980 for the inks of "La longue marche" ("The Long March") painted a slightly different picture though. Already recognizing that the two men were living in different worlds, he noted that Charlier was not pleased with Giraud taking on an assistant, afraid that it might have been a prelude to him leaving the series in order to pursue his "experimentations" as Mœbius further. While Charlier was willing to overlook Giraud's "philandering" in his case only, he was otherwise of the firm conviction that artists, especially his own, should totally and wholeheartedly devote themselves to their craft, as Charlier had always considered the medium.[59] Even Giraud was in later life led to believe that Charlier apparently "detested" his other work, looking upon it as something akin to "treason", though his personal experiences with the author was that he had kept an "open mind" in this regard, at least in his case. According to Giraud, Charlier's purported stance negatively influenced his son Philippe, causing their relationship to rapidly deteriorate into open animosity, after the death of his father.[56][60]

Post-Pilote (1979-2007)

In late 1979, the long-running disagreement Charlier and Giraud had with their publishing house Dargaud over the residuals from Blueberry came to a head. They began the Western comic Jim Cutlass as a means to put the pressure on Dargaud.[56] It did not work, and Charlier and Giraud turned their back on the parent publisher definitively,[48] leaving for greener pastures elsewhere, and in the process taking all of Charlier's co-creations with them. It would be nearly fifteen years before the Blueberry series returned to Dargaud after Charlier died. After the first album, "Mississippi River", first serialized in Métal hurlant and for two decades remaining an one-shot, Giraud took on scripting the revitalized series after Charlier had died, while leaving the artwork to fr:Christian Rossi.[61]

When Charlier, Giraud's collaborator on Blueberry, died in 1989, Giraud assumed responsibility for the scripting of the main series, the last outing of which, "Apaches", released in 2007. Blueberry has been translated into 19 languages, the first English book translations being published in 1977/78 by UK publisher Egmont/Methuen, though its publication was cut short after only four volumes. The original Blueberry series has spun off a prequel series called Young Blueberry, but the artwork was after 1984 left to Colin Wilson and later fr:Michel Blanc-Dumont after the first three original volumes in that series, as well as the by Giraud written, but by William Vance penciled 1991-2000 intermezzo series called Marshal Blueberry.[45]

While Giraud has garnered universal praise and acclaim for his work as "Mœbius" (especially in the US, the UK and Japan), it should be noted that as "Gir", Blueberry has always remained his most successful and most recognized work in native France itself and in mainland Europe, despite its artist developing somewhat of a love/hate relationship with his co-creation in later life, which was exemplified by him regularly taking an extended leave of absence from his co-creation. That Blueberry has always remained his primary source of income, allowing him to fully indulge in his artistic endeavors as Mœbius, was admitted as such by Giraud as early as 1979, "If a album of Moebius is released, about 10.000 people are interested. A Blueberry album sells at least 100.000 copies [in France],"[62][55] and as late as 2005, "Blueberry is in some ways the "sponsor" of Moebius, for years now."[63]

Science fiction and fantasy comics

The "Mœbius" pseudonym, which Giraud came to use for his science fiction and fantasy work, was born in 1963,[17] while he was working on the Hachette project, as he did not like "to work on paintings alone all day", and "like an alcoholic needing his alcohol" had to create comics.[64] In a satire magazine called Hara-Kiri, Giraud used the name for 21 strips in 1963–64. Though Giraud enjoyed the artistic freedom and atmosphere at the magazine greatly, he eventually gave up his work there as Blueberry, on which he had embarked in the mean time, demanded too much of his energy, aside from being a better paid job. Magazine editor-in-chief Cavanna was loath to let Giraud go, not understanding why Giraud would want to waste his talents on a "kiddy comic".[64] Subsequently, the pseudonym went unused for a decade, that is for comics at least, as Giraud continued its use for side-projects as illustrator. In the late 1960s-early 1970s, Giraud provided interior front, and back flyleaf illustrations as Mœbius for several outings in the science fiction book club series fr:Club du livre d'anticipation, a limited edition hardcover series, collecting work from seminal science fiction writers, from French publisher fr:Éditions OPTA, continuing to do so throughout the 1970s with several additional covers for the publisher's Fiction (the magazine that introduced Giraud to science fiction at age 16[65]) and fr:Galaxie-bis science fiction magazine and pocket book series. Additionally, this period in time also saw four vinyl record music productions endowed with Mœbius sleeve art.[30] Much of this illustration art has been reproduced in Giraud's first art book as Mœbius, aptly entitled "Mœbius", released in 1980.[39][66] There actually had also been a personal reason as well for Giraud to suspend his career as Mœbius comic artist; after he had returned from his second trip from Mexico, he found himself confronted with the artist's version of a writer's block as far as Mœbius comics were concerned, partly because Blueberry consumed all his energy. "For eight months I tried, but I could not do it, so I quit", stated Giraud additionally.[64] Giraud's statement notwithstanding though, he did a couple of Hara-Kiriesque satirical comic shorts for Pilote in the early 1970s, but under the pseudonym "Gir", most of which reprinted in the comic book Gir œuvres: "Tome 1, Le lac des émeraudes",[67] also collecting shorts he had created for the Fleurus magazines, Bonux-Boy, and the late-1960s TOTAL Journal magazine.[25]

L'Écho des savanes (1974)

Excerpt from the "Cauchemar Blanc" comic as cover for the 1991 DVD

In 1974 he truly revived the Mœbius pseudonym for comics, and the very first, 12-page, story he created as such – while on one of his stopovers from America when the Dune production was in a lull – was "Cauchemar Blanc" ("White Nightmare"), published in the magazine L'Écho des savanes, issue 8, 1974. The black & white story dealt with the racist murder of an immigrant of North-African descent, and stands out as one of the very few emphatic socially engaged works of Giraud.[68] Bearing in mind Giraud's fascination with the Western genre in general and the cultural aspects in particular of Native-Americans – and whose plight Giraud had always been sympathetic to[lower-alpha 3] – , it is hardly a surprise that two later examples of such rare works were Native-American themed.[lower-alpha 4] These concerned the 2-page short story "Wounded Knee",[70] inspired by the eponymous 1973 incident staged by Oglala Lakota, and the 3-page short story "Discours du Chef Seattle", first published in the artbook "Made in L.A."[71] ("The Words of Chief Seattle", in Epic's "Ballad for a Coffin"). Giraud suddenly bursting out onto the comic scene as "Mœbius", caught European readership by surprise, and it took many of them a couple of years before the realization had sunk in that "Jean [Gir]raud" and "Mœbius" were, physically at least, one and the same artist.[68]

It was when he was brainstorming with the founding editors of the magazine (founded by former Pilote friends and co-artists in the wake of the revolt at the publisher, when they decided to strike out on their own), that Giraud came up with his first major Mœbius work, "Le bandard fou" ("The Horny Goof"). Released directly as album (a first for Mœbius comics) in black & white by the magazine's publisher,[72] the humorous and satirical story dealt with a law-abiding citizen of the planet Souldaï, who awakens one day, only to find himself with a permanent erection. Pursued through space and time by his own puritanical authorities, who frown upon the condition, and other parties, who have their own intentions with the hapless bandard, he eventually finds a safe haven on the asteroid Fleur of Madame Kowalsky, after several hilarious adventures. When discounting the as "Gir" signed "La déviation", it is in this story that Giraud's signature, minute "Mœbius" art style, for which he became famed not that much later, truly comes into its own. Another novelty introduced in the book, is that the narrative is only related on the right-hand pages; the left-hand pages are taken up by one-page panels depicting an entirely unrelated cinematographic sequence of a man transforming after he has snapped his fingers. The story did raise some eyebrows with critics accusing Giraud of pornography at the time, but one reviewer put it in perspective when stating, "Peut-être Porno, mais Graphique!", which loosely translates as "Porn maybe, but Graphic Art for sure!".[73] In the editorial of the 1990 American edition, Giraud has conceded that he was envious of what his former Pilote colleagues had achieved with L'Écho des savanes in regard to creating a free, creative environment for their artists, he had already enjoyed so much back at Hara-Kiri, and that it was an inspiration for the endeavor, Giraud embarked upon next.

Métal hurlant (1974-1982)

Mœbius cover art for the first Métal Hurlant issue and the second Heavy Metal issue

Later that year, after Dune was permanently canceled with him definitively returning to France, Giraud became one of the founding members of the comics art group and publishing house "Les Humanoïdes Associés", together with fellow comic artists Jean-Pierre Dionnet, Philippe Druillet (likewise Pilote colleagues) and (outsider) financial director Bernard Farkas. In imitation of the example set by the L'Écho des savanes founding editors, it was therefore as such also an indirect result of the revolt these artists had previously staged at Pilote, and whose employ they had left for the undertaking.[74] Together they started the monthly magazine Métal hurlant ("Screaming metal") in December 1974,[75] and for which he had temporarily abandoned his Blueberry series. The translated version was known in the English-speaking world as Heavy Metal, and started its release in April 1977, actually introducing Giraud's work to North-American readership.[76] Mœbius' famous serial "The Airtight Garage" and his groundbreaking "Arzach" both began in Métal hurlant.[77] Unlike Hara-Kiri and L'Écho des savanes though, whose appeal has always remained somewhat limited to the socially engaged satire and underground comic scenes, it was Métal hurlant in particular that revolutionized the world of Franco-Belgian bandes dessinées,[49] whereas its American cousin left an indelible impression on a generation of not only American comic artists, but on film makers as well as evidenced below.

The opening panel of Mœbius's "Arzach"

Starting its publication in the first issue of Métal hurlant, "Arzach" is a wordless 1974-1975 comic, executed directly in color and created as a conscious attempt to breathe new life into the comic genre which at the time was dominated by American superhero comics in the United States, and by the traditional, adolescent oriented bandes dessinée in Europe.[78] It tracks the journey of the title character flying on the back of his pterodactyl through a fantastic world mixing medieval fantasy with futurism. Unlike most science fiction comics, it is, save for the artful executed story titles, entirely devoid of captions, speech balloons and written sound effects. It has been argued that the wordlessness provides the strip with a sense of timelessness, setting up Arzach's journey as a quest for eternal, universal truths.[2] The short stories "L'Homme est-il bon?" ("Is Man Good?", in issue 10, 1976, after the first publication in Pilote, issue 744, 1974, which however woke Giraud up to the "unbearable realization" that he was "enriching" the publisher with his Mœbius work, thereby expediting his departure.[79]), "Ballade" ("The Ballade", 1977 and inspired by the poem "Fleur" by French poet Arthur Rimbaud[80]), "Ktulu" (issue 33bis, 1978) and "Citadelle aveugle" ("The White Castle", in issue 51, 1980 and oddly enough signed as "Gir") were examples of additional stories Giraud created directly in color, shortly after "Arzach". 1976 saw the Métal hurlant, issues 7-8, publication of "The Long Tomorrow", written by Dan O'Bannon in 1974 during lulls in the pre-production of Jodorowsky's Dune.[81]

His series The Airtight Garage, starting its magazine run in issue 6, 1976, is particularly notable for its non-linear plot, where movement and temporality can be traced in multiple directions depending on the readers' own interpretation even within a single planche (page or picture). The series tells of Major Grubert, who is constructing his own multi-level universe on an asteroid named Fleur (from the "Bandard fou" universe incidentally, and the first known instance of the artist's attempts of tying all his "Mœbius" creations into one coherent Airtight Garage universe), where he encounters a wealth of fantastic characters including Michael Moorcock's creation Jerry Cornelius.[82]

1978 marked the publication of the 54-page "Les yeux du chat" ("Eyes of the Cat"). The dark, disturbing and surreal tale dealt with a blind boy in a non-descript empty cityscape, who has his pet eagle scout for eyes, which it finds by taking these from a street cat and offering them to his awaiting companion who, while grateful, expresses his preference for the eyes of a child. The story premise originated from a brainstorming session Alejandro Jodorowsky had with his fellows of the Académie Panique, a group concentrated on chaotic and surreal performance art, as a response to surrealism becoming mainstream.[83] Jodorowksy worked out the story premise as a therapy to alleviate the depression he was in after the failure of his Dune project and presented the script to Giraud in 1977 during a visit to Paris. Deeming the story too short for a regular, traditional comic, it was Giraud who suggested the story to be told on the format he had already introduced in "Le bandard fou", to wit, as single panel pages. On recommendation of Jodorowsky, he refined the format by relating the eagle's quest on the right-hand pages, while depicting the awaiting boy in smaller single panel left-hand pages from a contra point-of-view. Giraud furthermore greatly increased his already high level of detail by making extensive use of zipatone for the first time.[84] Considered a key and seminal work, both for its art and storytelling, setting Jodorowsky off on his career as comic writer,[85] the art evoked memories of the wood engravings from the 19th century, including those of Gustave Doré, Giraud discovered and admired in the books of his grandparents, when he was living there in his childhood, though it – like "La déviation" – has remained somewhat of an one-shot in Giraud's body of work in its utilization of such a high detail level.[86] The story, printed on yellow paper to accentuate the black & white art, was originally published directly as a to 5000 copies limited book, as a gift item for relations of the publisher.[87] It was only after expensive pirate editions started to appear that the publisher decided to make the work available commercially on a wider scale, starting in 1981.[88][89] Jodorowsky had intended the work to be the first of a trilogy, but that never came to fruition.[90]

In a certain way "Les yeux du chat" concluded a phase that had started with "La Déviation",[85] and this viewpoint was adhered to by the publisher who had coined the era "Les années Métal Hurlant" on one of its latter-day anthologies.[91] The very first "Mœbius" anthology collection the publisher released as such, was the 1980-1985 Moebius œuvres complètes six-volume collection of which two, volumes 4, "La Complainte de l'Homme Programme"[92] and 5, "Le Désintégré Réintégré"[93] ( (the two of them in essence comprising an expanded version of the 1980 original[66]), were Mœbius art books.[94] It also concluded a phase in which Giraud was preoccupied in a "characteristic period in his life" in which he was "very somber and pessimistic about my life", resulting in several of his "Mœbius" stories of that period ending in death and destruction.[95] These included the poetic "Ballade", in which Giraud killed off the two protagonists, something he came to regret a decade later in this particular case.[80]

In the magazine's issue 58 of 1980 Giraud started his famous L'Incal series in his third collaboration with Jodorowsky.[96] However, by this time Giraud felt that his break-out success as "Mœbius" had come at a cost. He had left Pilote to escape the pressure and stifling conditions he was forced to work under, seeking complete creative freedom, but now it was increasingly becoming "as stifling as it had been before with Blueberry", as he conceded in 1982, adding philosophically, "The more you free yourself, the more powerless you become!".[97] How deeply ingrained this sentiment was, was evidenced in a short interview in Métal Hurlant, issue 82, later that year, where an overworked Giraud stated, "I will finish the Blueberry series, I will finish the John Difool [Incal] series and then I'm done. Then I will quit comics!" At the time he had just finished working as storyboard, and production design artist on the Movie Tron, something he had enjoyed immensely. Fortunately for his fans, Giraud did not act upon his impulse as history has shown, though he did take action to escape the hectic Parisian comic scene in 1980 by moving himself and his family as far away from Paris as possible in France, by relocating to the small city of Pau at the foothills of the Pyrenees.[55] It was while he was residing in Pau that Giraud started to take an interest in the teachings of Jean-Paul Appel-Guéry, becoming an active member of his group and partaking in their gatherings.[98]

Tahiti (1983-1984)

From 1985 to 2001 he also created his six-volume fantasy series Le Monde d'Edena, which has appeared in English as The Aedena Cycle.[99] The stories were strongly influenced by the teachings of Jean-Paul Appel-Guéry,[lower-alpha 5] and Guy-Claude Burger's instinctotherapy. In effect, Giraud and his family did join Appel-Guéry's commune on Tahiti in 1983, until late 1984, when the family moved to the United States, where Giraud set up shop firstly in Santa Monica, and subsequently in Venice and Woodland Hills, California.[101] Giraud's one-shot comic book "La nuit de l'étoile"[102] was co-written by Appel-Guéry, and has been the most visible manifestation of Giraud's stay on Tahiti, aside from the artbooks "La memoire du futur"[103] and "Venise celeste".[104] Concurrently collaborating on "La nuit de l'étoile" was young artist Marc Bati, also residing at the commune at the time, and for whom Giraud afterwards wrote the comic series Altor (The Magic Crystal), while in the US.[105] It was under the influence of Appel-Guéry's teachings that Giraud conceived a third pseudonym, Jean Gir – formally introduced to the public as "Jean Gir, Le Nouveau Mœbius" in "Venise celeste" (p. 33), though Giraud had by the time of publication already dispensed with the pseudonym himself – , which appeared on the art he created while on Tahiti, though not using it for his Aedena Cycle. Another member of the commune was Paula Salomon, for whom Giraud had already illustrated her 1980 book "La parapsychologie et vous".[106] Having to move statesite for work, served Giraud well, as he became increasingly disenchanted at a later stage with the way Appel-Guéry ran his commune on Tahiti, in the process dispensing with his short-lived third pseudonym.[15] His stay at the commune though, had practical implications on his personal life; Giraud gave up eating meat, smoking, coffee, alcohol and the use of mind-expanding substances, adhering to his newfound abstinence for the most part for the remainder of his life.[107]

During his stay on Tahiti, Giraud had co-founded his second publishing house under two concurrent imprints, Éditions Gentiane[108] (predominantly for his work as Gir, most notably Blueberry) and Éditions Aedena[109] (predominantly for his work as Mœbius, and not entirely by coincidence named after the series he was working on at the time), together with friend and former editor at Les Humanoïdes Associés, fr:Jean Annestay, for the express purpose to release his work in a more artful manner, such as limited edition art prints, art books ("La memoire du futur" was first released under the Gentiane imprint, and reprinted under that of Aedena) and art portfolios. Both men had already released the very first such art book in the Humanoïdes days,[66] and the format then conceived – to wit, a large 30x30cm book format at first, with art organized around themes, introduced by philosophical poetry by Mœbius – was adhered to for later such releases, including "La memoire du futur".

Marvel Comics (1984-1989)

"There were thousands of professionals who knew my work. That has always amazed me every time I entered some graphics, or animation studio, at Marvel or even at George Lucas'. Mentioning the name Jean Giraud did not cause any of the present pencillers, colorists or storyboard artists to even bat an eye. Yet, whenever I introduced myself as "Mœbius", all of them jumped up to shake my hand. It was incredible!"
— Giraud, Cagnes-sur-Mer 1988, on his notoriety as "Mœbius" in the United States.[110]
Cover for the 1998 edition of Silver Surfer: Parable

After having arrived in California, Giraud's wife Claudine set up Giraud's third publishing house Starwatcher Graphics in 1985,[111] essentially the US branch of Gentiane/Aedena with the same goals, resulting in the release of, among others, the extremely limited art portfolio La Cité Feu, a collaborative art project of Giraud with Geoff Darrow (see below). However, due to their unfamiliarity with the American publishing world, the company did not do well, and in an effort to remedy the situation Claudine hired the French/American editor couple Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier, whom she had met at the summer 1985 San Diego ComicCon, as editors-in-chief for Starwatcher, also becoming shareholders in the company.[110] Already veterans of the US publishing world (and Mœbius fans), it was the Lofficier couple that managed to convince editor-in-chief Archie Goodwin of Marvel Comics to publish most of Moebius' hitherto produced work on a wider scale in the US – contrary to the Heavy Metal niche market releases by HM Communications in the late 1970s – in graphic novel format trade editions, under its Epic imprint from 1987-1994. These incidentally, included three of Mœbius' latter-day art books, as well as his Blueberry Western comic.[112]

It was for the Marvel/Epic publication effort that it was decided to dispense with the "Jean [Gir]aud"/"Mœbius" dichotomy – until then strictly adhered to by the artist – , as both the artist's given name and his Blueberry creation were all but unknown in the English speaking world. This was contrary to his reputation as "Mœbius", already acquired in the Heavy Metal days, and from then on used for all his work in the English speaking world (and Japan), though the dichotomy remained adhered to elsewhere, including native France.[113]

A two-issue Silver Surfer miniseries (later collected as Silver Surfer: Parable), written by Stan Lee and drawn by Giraud (as Mœbius), was published through Marvel's Epic Comics imprint in 1988 and 1989. According to Giraud, this was his first time working under the Marvel method instead of from a full script, and he has admitted to being baffled by the fact that he already had a complete story synopsis on his desk only two days after he had met Stan Lee for the first time, having discussed the – what Giraud then assumed a mere – proposition over lunch.[75] This miniseries won the Eisner Award for best finite/limited series in 1989. Mœbius' version was discussed in the 1995 submarine thriller Crimson Tide by two sailors pitting his version against those of Jack Kirby, with the main character played by Denzel Washington emphasizing the Kirby one being the better of the two. Becoming aware of the reference around 1997, Giraud was later told around 2005 by the movie's director Tony Scott, that it was he who had written in the dialog as an homage to the artist on behalf of his brother Ridley, a Mœbius admirer, and not (uncredited) script doctor Quentin Tarentino (known for infusing his works with pop culture references) as he was previously led to believe. An amused Giraud quipped, "It's better than a big stature, because in a way, I can not dream of anything better to be immortal [than] being in a movie about submarines!"[1]

As a result, from his cooperation with Marvel, Giraud delved deeper into the American super hero mythology and created super hero art stemming from both Marvel and DC Comics, which were sold as art prints, posters or included in calendars.[114] Even as late as 1997, Giraud had created cover art for two DC comic book outings, Hardware (Vol. 1, issue 49, March 1997) and Static (Vol. 1, issue 45, March 1997), after an earlier cover for Marvel Tales (Vol. 2, issue 253, September 1991). Another project Giraud embarked upon in his "American period", was for a venture into that other staple of American pop culture, trading cards. Trading card company Comic Images released a "Mœbius Collector Cards" set in 1993, featuring characters and imagery from all over his Mœbius universe, though his Western work was excluded. None of the images were lifted from already pre-existing work, but was especially created anew by Giraud the year previously.

Although Giraud had taken up residence in California for five years – holding a temporary residence (the O-1 "Extraordinary Ability" category,[115] including the "International Artist" status[116]) visa – , he maintained a transient lifestyle, as his work had him frequently travel to Belgium and native France (maintaining a home in Paris), as well as to Japan, for extended periods of time. His stay in the United States was an inspiration for his aptly called Made in L.A. art book,[71] and much of his art he had produced in this period of time, including his super hero art, was reproduced in this, and the follow-up art book Fusions,[117] the latter of which having seen a translation in English by Epic.

Giraud's extended stay in the US, garnered him an 1986 Inkpot Award, an additional 1991 Eisner Award, as well as three Harvey Awards in the period 1988–1991 for the various graphic novel releases by Marvel. It was in this period that Giraud, who had already picked up Spanish as a second language as a result from his various trips to Mexico and his dealings with Jodorowsky and his retinue, also picked up sufficient language skills to communicate in English.[118][1]

Latter-day work

In late summer 1989, Giraud returned to France, definitively as it turned out, though that was initially not his intent. His family had already returned to France earlier, as his children wanted to start their college education in their native county and wife Claudine had accompanied them to set up home in Paris. However, it also turned out that his transient lifestyle had taken its toll on the marriage, causing the couple to drift apart, and it was decided upon his return to enter into a "living apart together" relationship, which allowed for an "enormous freedom and sincerity" without "demands and frustrations" for both spouses, according to the artist.[119] Additionally, Giraud had met Isabelle Champeval during a book signing in Venice, Italy in February 1984, and entered into a relationship with her in 1987, with resulted in the birth of second son Raphaël in 1989. Giraud's marriage with Claudine was legally ended in December 1994, without much drama according to Giraud, as both spouses had realized that "each wanted something different out of life".[15] Exemplary of the marriage ending without any ill will was, that Claudine was emphatically acknowledged for her contributions in the 1997 artbook "Blueberry's",[120] and the documentary made fore the occasion of its release. Giraud and Isabelle were married on 13 May 1995, and the union resulted in their second child, daughter Nausicaa, the same year.[6] For Giraud his second marriage was of such great personal importance, that he henceforth considered his life divided in a pre-Isabelle part and a post-Isabelle part, having coined his second wife "the key to the whole grand design".[121] Isabelle's sister and Giraud's sister-in-law, Claire, became a regular contributor as colorist on Giraud's latter-day work.[122]

The changes in his personal life were also accompanied with changes in his business holdings during 1988-1990. His co-founded publishing house Gentiane/Aedena went into receivership in 1988, going bankrupt a short time thereafter. The American subsidiary Starwatcher Graphics followed in its wake,[111] partly because it was a shared marital possession of the original Giraud couple. In 1989 Giraud sold his shares in Les Humanoïdes Associés to Fabrice Giger, thereby formally severing his ownership ties with the publisher, which however remained the regular publisher of his Mœbius work from the Métal hurlant era, including L'Incal. Together with Isabelle he founded Stardom in 1990, his first true family operated business, according to Giraud,[123] with the to 1525 copies limited mini art portfolio "Mockba - carnet de bord" becoming the company's first recorded publication in September the same year.[124] Apart from being a publishing house, it was concurrently an art gallery, located on 27 Rue Falguière, 75015 Paris, organizing themed exhibitions on a regular basis. In 1997, the company was renamed Moebius Production – singular, despite the occasional and erroneous use of the plural, even by the company itself.[125] The company, in both publishing and art gallery iterations, is as of 2017 still being run by Isabelle Giraud and her sister Claire.[126]

While Giraud was in the midst of Blueberry's "OK Corral" cycle, he also embarked on a new sequel cycle of his acclaimed Incal main series, called Après l'Incal (After the Incal). Yet, after he had penciled the first outing in the series, "Le nouveau rêve",[127] he found himself confronted with "too many things that attract me, too many desires in all the senses", causing him to be no longer able to "devote myself to the bande dessinée as befitting a professional in the traditional sense". Despite repeated pleas to convince Giraud otherwise, it left writer Jodorowsky with no other recourse than to start anew with a new artist.[128] This insight had repercussions though, as Giraud, after he had finished the "OK Corral" cycle in 2005, no longer continued to produce comics and/or art on a commercial base, but rather on a personal base, usually under the aegis of his own publishing house Mœbius Production.

As Mœbius Production, Giraud published from 2000 to 2010 Inside Mœbius (French text despite English title), an illustrated autobiographical fantasy in six hardcover volumes totaling 700 pages.[8] Pirandello-like, he appears in cartoon form as both creator and protagonist trapped within the story alongside his younger self and several longtime characters such as Blueberry, Arzak (the latest re-spelling of the Arzach character's name), Major Grubert (from The Airtight Garage) and others.

Jean Giraud drew the first of the two-part volume of the XIII series titled La Version Irlandaise ("The Irish Version") from a script by Jean Van Hamme,[129] to accompany the second part by the regular team Jean Van Hamme–William Vance, Le dernier round ("The Last Round"). Both parts were published on the same date (13 November 2007)[130] and were the last ones written by Van Hamme before Yves Sentes took over the series.[131] The contribution was also a professional courtesy to the series' artist, Vance, who had previously provided the artwork for the first two titles in the by Giraud written Marshall Blueberry spin-off series.

Late in life, Giraud also decided to revive his seminal Arzak character in an elaborate new adventure series; the first (and last in hindsight) volume of a planned trilogy, Arzak l'arpenteur, appeared in 2010.[132] He also added to the Airtight Garage series with two volumes entitled "Le chasseur déprime" (2008[133]) and "Major" (2011[134]), as well as the art book "La faune de Mars" (2011[135]), the latter two initially released in a limited, 1000 copy French only, print run by Mœbius Production. By this time, Giraud created his comic art on a specialized graphic computer tablet, as its enlargement features had become an indispensable aid, because of his failing eyesight.

Creating comics became increasingly difficult for Giraud, as his eyesight started to fail him in his last years, having undergone severe surgery in 2010 to stave off blindness in his left eye, and it was mainly for this reason that Giraud increasingly concentrated on creating single-piece art, both as "Gir" and as "Mœbius", on larger canvases on either commission basis or under the aegis of Mœbius Production.[136] Much of the latter artwork was from 2005 onward, alongside older original art Giraud still had in his possession, sold by the company for considerable prices in specialized comic auctions at such auction houses like Artcurial,[137] Hôtel Drouot[138] and Millon & Associés.[139]

Giraud cover for L'Express magazine, August 1974

Illustrator and author

As already indicated above, Giraud had throughout his entire career made illustrations for books, magazines and music productions[30] (though playing the piano and electric guitar, Giraud was, unlike his second son Raphaël, regrettably not a creative musician himself by his own admission, but did have a lifelong fascination with Jazz[140]), illustrating for example the 1987 first edition of the science fiction novel Project Pendulum by Robert Silverberg,[141] and the 1994 French edition[142] of the novel The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. The subsequent year Giraud followed up in the same vein as the Coelho novel, with his cover and interior illustrations for a French 1995 reprint of "Ballades" from the French medieval poet François Villon.[143]

An out-of-the-ordinary latter-day contribution as such, constituted his illustrations as "Mœbius" for the Thursday March 6, 2008 issue of the Belgian newspaper Le Soir. His illustrations accompanied news articles throughout the newspaper, providing a Mœbiusienne look on events. In return, the newspaper, for the occasion entitled "Le Soir par (by) Mœbius", featured two half-page editorials on the artist (pp. 20 & 37).

Under the names Giraud, Gir and Mœbius, he also wrote several comics for other comic artists as listed below, and the early ones including Jacques Tardi.[144] and fr:Claude Auclair[145] Aside from writing for other comic artists, he also wrote story outlines for the movies Les Maîtres du temps, Internal Transfer, Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland and Thru the Moebius Strip as outlined further down the line.

As author on personal title, Giraud has – apart from his own bande dessinée scripts – written philosophical poetry that accompanied his art in his Mœbius artbooks of the 1980s and 1990s. He also wrote the "Story Notes" editorials for the American Epic publications, providing background information on his work contained therein. In 1998, he took time off to write his Moebius-Giraud: Histoire de mon double autobiography.[146]

Films

"Tron was not a big hit. The movie went out in theaters in the same week as E.T. and, oh, that was a disaster for it. There was also Blade Runner and Star Trek [The Wrath of Khan] that summer so it was a battle of giants. Tron was a piece of energy trying to survive. It is still alive. It survives. And the new movie is what Steven wanted to do back then but at that time CG was very odd and we were pioneers. I almost did the first computer-animated feature after that, it was called Star Watcher, we had the story, we had the preparation done, we were ready to start. But it came apart; the company did not give us the approval. It was too far, the concept to do everything in computer animation. We were waiting, waiting, and then our producer died in a car accident. Everything collapsed. That was my third contribution to animation and my worst experience. [Les Maîtres du Temps] is a strange story, it’s a small movie, and cheap — incredibly cheap –it was more than independent. When I saw the film for the first time I was ashamed. It’s not a Disney movie, definitely. But because the movie has, maybe a flavor, a charm, it is still alive after all that time. More than 35 years now and it is still here."
— Giraud, Burbank, California, 2011, on his animation movie experiences.[136]

Giraud's friend Jean-Claude Mézières has divulged in the 1970s that their very first outing into the world of cinema concerned a 1957 animated Western, unsurprisingly considering their shared passion for the genre, "Giraud, with his newfound prestige because of his trip to Mexico, started a pro career at Cœurs Valiants, but together with two other friends we tackled a very ambitious project first: a cartoon western for which Giraud drew the sets and the main characters. Alas, rather disappointingly, we had to stop after only 45 seconds!"[147] Any further movie aspirations Giraud, who himself had considered the effort "too laborious",[148] might have had entertained had to wait until he received the 1974 invitation of Alejandro Jodorowsky to work on his planned adaptation of Frank Herbert's Dune, which was however abandoned in pre-production.[149] Jodorowsky's Dune, a 2013 American-French documentary directed by Frank Pavich, explores Jodorowsky's unsuccessful attempt. Giraud, a non-English speaker at the time, has later admitted that the prospect of moving over to Los Angeles filled him with trepidations at the time, causing him to procrastinate initially. It was friend Philippe Druilet (with whom he would co-found Les Humanoïdes Associés later that year) who pushed him to up and go, which he did by going AWOL again from his job at Pilote. Giraud was grateful for Druillet pushing him as he found that he reveled in his first Hollywood experience.[148] In the end the project took nine months before it fell apart, but Giraud's presence was not always required, giving him ample time to return to France on several occasions, to pursue his other work, such as his work for L'Écho des savanes and, most importantly, to firstly finish up on Blueberry's "Nez Cassé", which he ultimately did in record time, this time formally quitting Pilote afterwards.[51]

Despite Jodowowsky's project falling through, it had attracted the attention of other movie makers. One of them was Ridley Scott who managed to reassemble a large part of Jodorowsky's original creative team, including Giraud, for his 1979 science fiction thriller Alien. Hired as a concept artist, Giraud's stay on the movie lasted only a few days, as he had obligations elsewhere. Nonetheless, his designs for the Nostromo crew attire, and their spacesuits in particular, were almost one-on-one adopted by Scott and appearing onscreen as designed,[150] resulting in what Giraud had coined "two weeks of work and ten years of fallout in media and advertising".[148] Scott did explicitly acknowledge "Mœbius" for his contributions in the special features for the movie in the Alien Quadrilogy home media collection. Scott was taken with Giraud's art, having cited "The Long Tomorrow" as an influence on his second major movie Blade Runner of 1982 (see below), and invited him again for both this, and his subsequent third major movie Legend of 1985, which Giraud had to decline in both cases for, again, obligations elsewhere. He especially regretted not having been able to work on the latter movie, having deemed it "very good".[148]

Giraud/Mœbius movie poster art for Tusk on the left, and Les Maîtres du temps on the right

1981 saw the release of the animated film Heavy Metal from of Ivan Reitman. The heavily "Arzach"-inspired last, "Taarna", section of the movie, has led to the persistent misconception, especially held in the United States, that Giraud had provided characters and situations for the segment, albeit uncredited.[151] Giraud however, had already emphatically squashed that particular misconception himself on an early occasion, "I had absolutely nothing to do with it," stated the artist in 1982, "Sure, the people who made the movie were inspired by quite a few things from "Arzach"," further explaining that, while the American producers had indeed intended to use the artist's material from the eponymous magazine, there were legalities involved between the American and French mother magazines, because the latter had financial interests in Laloux's below mentioned Les Maîtres du temps that was concurrently in development. The American producers went ahead regardless of the agreements made between them and Métal hurlant. While not particularly pleased with the fact, Giraud was amused when third parties wanted to sue the Americans on his behalf. Giraud however, managed to convince his editor-in-chief Jean-Pierre Dionnet (one of his co-founding friends of Métal hurlant) to let the issue slide, as he found "all that fuss with lawyers" not worth his while, aside from the incongruous circumstance that the French magazine was running advertisements for the American movie.[152]

Still, Alien led to two other movie assignments, this time as both concept and storyboard artist, 1982. The first one concerned the Disney science fiction movie Tron, whose director Steven Lisberger specifically requested Giraud, after he had discovered his work in Heavy Metal.[148] The second assignment concerned Giraud's collaboration with director René Laloux to create the science fiction feature-length animated movie Les Maîtres du temps (released in English as Time Masters) based on a novel by Stefan Wul. He and director Rene Laloux shared the award for Best Children's Film at the Fantafestival that year.[151] For the latter, Giraud was also responsible for the poster art and the comic adaption of the same title, with some of his concept and storyboard art featured in a "making-of" book to boot.[153] Excepting Les Maîtres du temps, Giraud's movie work had him travel to Los Angeles for longer periods of time.

Outside his actual involvement with motion pictures, Giraud was in this period of time also occasionally commissioned to create poster art for, predominantly European, movies. Movies for which Giraud, also as "Mœbius", created poster art included, Touche pas à la femme blanche ! (1974 as Gir, three 120x160 cm versions), S*P*Y*S (1974, unsigned, American movie but poster art for release in France), fr:Vous ne l'emporterez pas au paradis (1975, unsigned), Les Chiens (1979 as Mœbius, rejected, used as cover for Taboo 4), Tusk (1980 as Giraud, a Jodorowsky film), and fr:La Trace (1983 as Mœbius).

As his two 1982 movies coincided with the end of his Métal hurlant days and his departure for Tahiti shortly thereafter, this era can be seen as Giraud's "first Hollywood period", especially since the next project he embarked on entailed a movie in which he was very much invested as initiator, writer and producer as well, contrary to the movies he hitherto had worked upon as a gun-for-hire.

While Giraud was residing in Appel-Guéry's commune, he, together with Appel-Guéry and another member of the commune, Paula Salomon, came up with a story premise for a major animated science fiction movie called Internal Transfer, which was endowed with the English title Starwatcher – after which Giraud's American publishing house was named. Slated for the production was Arnie Wong, whom Giraud had met during the production of Tron (and, incidentally, one of the animators of the vaunted "Taarna" segment of the Heavy Metal movie[154]), and it was actually Disney whom Giraud offered the production first. Disney, at the time not believing in the viability of such a production in animation, declined. Another member of the commune fronted some of the money for the project to proceed, and the production was moved to Wong's animation studio in Los Angeles. It was this circumstance that provided Giraud with his alibi to leave Appel-Guéry's commune and settle in California. Much to Giraud's disappointment and frustration though, the project eventually fell apart for several extraneous reasons, most notably for lack of funding, as related above by the artist.[148] Still, the concept art he provided for the project served as the basis for his first collaboration with Geoff Darrow, whom he had met previously on the production of Tron, on their 1985 City of Fire art portfolio. Some of the concept art was reprinted in the art book "Made in L.A.".[71]

Yet, despite this failure to launch, it did lead to his, what can be considered, "second Hollywood period" in his "American period". Concurrent with his career as a comic artist in the United States, invitations followed to participate as concept artist on Masters of the Universe (1987), Willow (1988), The Abyss (1989), and finally Yutaka Fujioka's Japanese animated feature film Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland (1989), for which he was not only the conceptual designer, but also the story writer. It was for this movie that Giraud resided in Japan for an extended period of time.[151][148] Giraud followed up on his involvement with Little Nemo by writing the first two outings of the 1994-2000 French graphic novel series of the same name, drawn by fr:Bruno Marchand.[155]

His definitive return to France in 1989 marked the beginning of Giraud's third and last movie period. Giraud made original character designs and did visual development for Warner Bros. partly animated 1996 movie Space Jam. 1997 saw his participation as concept artist on Luc Besson's science fiction epic The Fifth Element, which was of great personal importance for Giraud as it meant working together with his lifelong friend Jean-Claude Mézières, coming full circle after their very first 1957 attempt at creating a motion picture. The 2005 documentary made for this occasion was testament to the great friendship both men had for each other. Concurrently, Giraud's oldest child, daughter Hélène, was employed on the movie in a similar function, albeit uncredited, though Giraud had stated with fatherly pride, "Yes, she had cooperated in a truly engaged manner. She started at the crack of dawn, and only went home in the evening, after the whole team had stopped working."[156] Giraud's experience on the movie was however marred by the 2004 lawsuit he and Alejandro Jodorowsky leveled against Besson for alleged plagiarism of L'Incal, a lawsuit they lost.[157]

2005 saw the release of the Chinese movie Thru the Moebius Strip, based on a story by Giraud who also served as the production designer and the co-producer, and which reunited him with Arnie Wong, whereas his stint as concept designer on the 2012 animated science fiction movie Strange Frame, has become Giraud's final recorded motion picture contribution.[158]

Movie adaptations

In 1991 his graphic novel short, "Cauchemar Blanc", was cinematized by Matthieu Kassovitz, winning Kassovitz (but not Giraud) two film awards.[159] With fr:Arzak Rhapsody, Giraud saw his ambitions as a full-fledged animation movie maker at least in part fulfilled. A 2002 series for French television broadcaster France 2, it consisted of fourteen four minute long animated vignettes, based on Giraud's seminal character, for which he did the writing, drawings and co-production. Young daughter Nausicaa had voice-over appearances in three of the episodes together with her father.[160]

The Blueberry series was adapted for the screen in 2004, by Jan Kounen, as Blueberry: L'expérience secrète. Two previous attempts to bring Blueberry to the silver screen in the 1980s had fallen through; American actor Martin Kove had actually already been signed to play the titular role for one of the attempts.[161]

2010 saw the adaptation of "La planète encore" ("The Still Planet"), a short story from the Le Monde d'Edena universe – and which had won him his 1991 Eisner Award – into an animated short. Moebius Production served as a production company, with Isabelle Giraud serving as one of its producers. Giraud himself was one of the two directors of the short and it premiered at the «Mœbius transe forme» exposition at the Fondation Cartier pour l'art contemporain in Paris.[162]

Exhibitions

Part of the "many desires" that increasingly attracted Giraud in his later days, steering him away from creating traditional bandes dessinées, was his personal fascination and involvement with the many exhibitions dedicated to his work, that started to proliferate from the mid-1990s onward not only in native France, but internationally as well, causing him to frequently travel abroad, among others to Japan, for extended periods of time, with the 2010 «Mœbius transe forme» exposition in Paris becoming the apotheosis.[163]

Stamps

In 1988 Giraud was chosen, among 11 other winners of the prestigious Grand Prix of the Angoulême Festival, to illustrate a postage stamp set issued on the theme of communication.[171]

Style

Cover art for the Blueberry album Nez Cassé (1985). Giraud used oil paint as well as line drawings and he changed the artistic style of the Blueberry series several times.

Giraud's working methods were various and adaptable ranging from etchings, white and black illustrations, to work in colour of the ligne claire genre and water colours.[172] Giraud's solo Blueberry works were sometimes criticized by fans of the series because the artist dramatically changed the tone of the series as well as the graphic style.[173] However, Blueberry's early success was also due to Giraud's innovations, as he did not content himself with following earlier styles, an important aspect of his development as an artist.[174]

To distinguish between work by Giraud and Moebius, Giraud used a brush for his own work and a pen when he signed his work as Moebius. Giraud was known for being an astonishingly fast draftsman.[175]

His style has been compared to the Nouveaux réalistes, exemplified in his turn from the bowdlerized realism of Hergé's Tintin towards a grittier style depicting sex, violence and moral bankruptcy.[2]

Aided with the use of mind-expanding substances in the first part of his career, Giraud had cultivated various New Age type philosophies throughout his career, such as Guy-Claude Burger's instinctotherapy, which influenced his creation of the comic book series Le Monde d'Edena.[2][8] However, he dispensed with the use of drugs for the time being himself – though not condemning them, quite the contrary, as Giraud considered them a gateway to a hidden dreamworld ever since he was introduced in 1974 to the writings of Carlos Castaneda, and having started again with the use of marijuana in the last decade of his life, after a long abstinence – and outside teachers, or "gurus" as he himself had coined them, after his stay on Tahiti, instead continuing to seek deeper truths within himself on his own accord.[176] However, it also negatively influenced his relationship with Philippe Charlier, heir and steward of his father's Blueberry co-creation and legacy, who, as 50% co-owner, had no patience whatsoever with Giraud's New Age predilections, particularly for his admitted fondness for mind-expanding substances. Charlier jr. has vetoed several later Blueberry project proposals by Giraud, the aforementioned Blueberry 1900 project in particular, precisely for these reasons, as they were to prominently feature, Castaneda inspired, substance-induced scenes, going even as far as to take Giraud (successfully) to court to thwart his intentions.[56][177]

Death

Giraud died in Paris, on 10 March 2012, aged 73, after a long battle with cancer.[178][179] The immediate cause of death was pulmonary embolism caused by a lymphoma. Mœbius was buried on 15 March, in the Montparnasse Cemetery,[180] after the funeral services, held in the Saint Clotilde Basilica.[181] Fellow comic artist François Boucq (incidentally, the artist pegged by Giraud in person for the artwork of the canceled Blueberry 1900 project) stated that Mœbius was a "master of realist drawing with a real talent for humour, which he was still demonstrating with the nurses when I saw him in his hospital bed a fortnight ago".[182] Giraud left his estate to his second wife Isabelle and his four children.[183]

Biography

Throughout his entire career, Jean Giraud has given numerous interviews both in Europe as well as in the United States, but it is the series of interview sessions conducted by comics journalist Numa Sadoul that warrants special attention. Sadoul took a particular interest in the artist and followed the career of Giraud closely from the mid-1970s onward until the latter's death in 2012, conducting extensive in-depth interviews with the artist throughout this period of time with approximate two-decade intervals, which resulted in three consecutive, chronologically organized, interview books, Mister Mœbius et Docteur Gir (1976), Mœbius: Entretiens avec Numa Sadoul (1991), and Docteur Mœbius et Mister Gir: Entertiens ave Jean Giraud (2015, see below for bibliographical details on all editions), the latter two being each an edited, updated and expanded version of the previous one – and each title incidentally, featuring an entirely different selection of art. Excepting parts of the first book in SCHTROUMPF: Les cahiers de la BD (issue 25, July 1974), none of the later interviews had seen prior magazine publication, be it in part or in whole. The SCHTROUMPF interview excerpt, was by Giraud poured into a humorous eight-page autobiographical black & white comic (pp. 8–16). The comic, entitled "Entretien avec Jean Giraud", or "Mœbius Circa '74" as it is known in English, was however only reprinted in the 2015 edition of Sadoul's book as a preface, and in hindsight a precursor to Giraud's autobiographical Inside Mœbius comic books. The similarity had not been lost on the artist himself, after he had embarked on the Inside Mœbius series and realized, "Merde, that is exactly like the comic I have done with Numa!"[184]

Noteworthy were the testimonials Sadoul collected from seminal persons in Giraud's life and career which included among others his mother, first wife Claudine (of these two the only known published ones[7]), his mentor Jijé and many others, as well as the fact that Giraud spoke more freely about the aspects of his life and career (including the more contentious ones, such as his mind-expanding substance use and his very strained relationship with the aforementioned Philippe Charlier) than was commonplace in his more generic interviews, or even in his own, hereafter mentioned, autobiography. For editorial reasons, Sadoul omitted some of the outside testimonials from the second edition for his third.

Posthumously published, the 2015 title was fully sanctioned and endorsed by Giraud's widow Isabelle (who provided a foreword – praising Sadoul for his friendship and tenacity – , family pictures, privately created art and additional details on her husband's last two years of his life) and has therefore become the closest approximation of an "official biography" of the artist when discounting his own Inside Moebius autobiographical comic and his precursory autobiography Histoire de mon double. The latter, published as an unillustrated paperback in 1999 was the "biography written by Giraud on Mœbius & vice versa",[185] but constituted what Sadoul in his 2015 edition has coined a "snapshot in time", aside from the obvious fact that the last phase of the artist's career was not covered. Giraud himself considered his "enhanced" autobiography on which he had worked for a year, a "funny" piece of work, conceding that accuracy was left to be desired as he could not be bothered to correct mistakes made therein, finding "flavor" in the small inaccuracies, and also admitting that he gave his work only a cursory glance afterwards.[146]

Author Sadoul accounted for his work in the introduction of the 2015 edition where he summarized that the interviews for the first edition took three days in March 1974 and in August and September 1975 – and thus shortly before Giraud achieved fame in his second "Mœbius" career – at the artist's home in Fontenay-sous-Bois. Having kept more detailed records, the second edition took in total 19 hours and 45 minutes of interviews conducted between 18 and 21 October 1988 at the Sadoul's home in Cagnes-sur-Mer (for which Giraud and his future wife Isabelle especially traveled from Paris), augmented with an additional two hours at Giraud's home in Paris on 17 August 1989. The third edition accounted for a further 10 hours and 48 minutes worth of interviews, conducted between 15 September 2000 and 28 December 2011, either at Giraud's home in Paris or over the telephone. Sadoul acknowledged that the three series of interview sessions were snapshots in time of Giraud's life and career, causing the artist to occasionally contradict himself in later life, but chose not to redact or edit such earlier made statements (at most adding short, clarifying editorial annotations), instead transcribing these exactly as made at the time. Sadoul's reasoning was that by doing so, it reflected truthfully the spiritual development the artist had undergone throughout his career.

Influence and legacy

"They said that I changed their life, «You changed my life», «Your work is why I became an artist». Oh, it makes me happy. But you know at same time I have an internal broom to clean it all up. It can be dangerous to believe it. Someone wrote, «Moebius is a legendary artist» I[t] put[s] a frame around me. A legend — now I am like a unicorn."
— Giraud, Burbank, California, 2011, on the idolization accorded to him.[136]

Many artists from around the world have cited Giraud as an influence on their work. Testament to this was the publication of a special homage issue (HS 09) of the French comic journal dBD a month after Giraud's death. For the 96-page issue, which came in two cover variants, "Giraud, mort d'un géant" and "Moebius, Adieu à l'immortel", over 100 comic artists from all over the world, contributed art as tribute to the deceased artist.[186] The testimonials quoted below, are but a random selection of all the accolades given to the artist.

"Through Arzach, which dates from 1975, I believe. I only read it in 1980, and it was a big shock. Not only for me. All manga authors were shaken by this work. Unfortunately, when I discovered it, I already had a consolidated style so I couldn't use its influence to enrich my drawing. Even today, I think it has an awesome sense of space. I directed Nausicaä under Mœbius's influence."[189][190]
"I fell out of love with American comics, lost interest in the super-hero subject matter, was more interested in the fantasy I saw in the European art."[15]
"So it's entirely fair to say, and I've said it before, that the way Neuromancer-the-novel "looks" was influenced in large part by some of the artwork I saw in Heavy Metal. I assume that this must also be true of John Carpenter's Escape from New York, Ridley Scott's Blade Runner, and all other artefacts of the style sometimes dubbed 'cyberpunk'. Those French guys, they got their end in early."[191]
"You see it everywhere, it runs through so much you can’t get away from it."[136]
"When I first saw the work of 'Mœbius' – a.k.a. 'Gir', both noms de plume of Jean Giraud – his fresh science-fiction and fantasy comic art forever altered my perception of the comic medium.[76]
"In all his drawings, Mœbius demonstrates a command of many disciplines in art. He is a master draftsman, a superb artist, and more: his vision is original and strong. Since first seeing the Mœbius illustrations in Heavy Metal years ago, I have been impressed and affected by his keen and unusual sense of design, and the distinctive way in which he depicts the fantastic. perhaps what strikes me most of all his work is it's sheer beauty–a beauty that has always given me great pleasure."
"I read [Métal Hurlant] over and over and envied the French because they had everything I dreamed of in comics – beautifully drawn, visionary and literate comics, for adults. I wanted to make comics like that when I grew up."[192]
"He's a unique talent endowed with an extraordinary visionary imagination that's constantly renewed and never vulgar. Moebius disturbs and consoles. He has the ability to transport us into unknown worlds where we encounter unsettling characters. My admiration for him is total. I consider him a great artist, as great as Picasso and Matisse."[193]
"The great Moebius died today, but the great Mœbius is still alive. Your body died today, your work is more alive than ever."[179]

Awards & Honors

Bibliography

Note: those works for which English translations have been published are noted as such. Their respective pages describe this further, and/or is detailed in the "English (collected) editions" section further down the line.

As Jean [Gir]aud

As Mœbius

English (collected) editions

Notes: for particulars on the English-language Blueberry publications, please refer to main article; contingent digital releases are not included for expediency; where available, links to the Grand Comics Database provided for detailed content descriptions of the individual short story collections.

HM Communications

The English-language versions of many of Mœbius's comics have been collected into various editions, beginning with a small series of US graphic novel sized trade paperbacks from HM Communications, Inc., collecting work originally published in its Heavy Metal magazine (the US version of the French original, co-founded by Giraud), and in which Moebius' work was introduced to American readership in the 1970s. It has been noted that the quality of the translations of HM Communications has been poor.[76]

Heavy Metal presents (1977–1981)

Marvel/Epic

Cover image of the 1987 Epic edition of Moebius 3 - The Airtight Garage

A far more comprehensive effort was undertaken at Marvel Comics under its Epic imprint in the late 1980s and early 1990s, initiated, translated and introduced by Jean-Marc and Randy Lofficier. The intent was to collect all comics Giraud had hitherto published in Europe as Mœbius into one single format collection, and in this Epic largely succeeded, when the eventual two – three when counting Blueberry as well – collections had run their courses around 1992. When initiated, the collections were otherwise unaltered published in Great Britain as well, with a lag ranging from a few months to a year, by Titan Books in a smaller print run of 6.000 copies per title – like the previous HM Communications book releases had been – as opposed to the initial 20.000 copies per title release by Epic with a continuous reprint option for those volumes selling out while the Epic publication effort was underway, a relative novelty in the US comic world at the time.[110] However, of the eventual eleven titles in the Fantasies softcover collection, only six (Mœbius 1 - Mœbius 6) were ultimately released by Titan Books. With the exception of Mœbius 9 – Stel (itself a very late addition to the Fantasies collection, being a near simultaneous international 1994 release), Giraud created new cover art for the Marvel/Epic releases, including the Incal (and Blueberry) series. Save for Mœbius ½ and aside from the covers, it was for the Fantasies collection that stories, originally done in black & white in the French source publications, received first time coloring, most notably The Airtight Garage.[38] Remarkably, Epic was aided by outsiders Dark Horse Comics and Graphitti Designs, who each added a volume to the Fantasies collection, adhering to the format as set by Epic, in which work was published Marvel/Epic itself apparently deemed too controversial to publish themselves, particularly the 0-volume for its heavy, albeit humorous, phallic theme.

Though some purist fans have frowned upon the coloring of the originally black & white stories, the Marvel/Epic Fantasies collection has nevertheless served as the template for similar collections subsequently released in not only native France, but in other countries as well.[208]

The Collected Fantasies of Jean Giraud (1987–1994):

The Incal collection (1988)
Mœbius' magnus opus as such, The Incal, was separately released both in the US and Great Britain in its own mini series, each title collecting two of the original French source publications:

The Marvel/Epic graphic novel releases earned Giraud his three Harvey Awards in the category "Best American Edition of Foreign Material" in 1988 (for the Fantasies collection), in 1989 (for The Incal collection) and in 1991 (for the Blueberry collection).

The Silver Surfer (1988–2012)
This miniseries won Giraud his Eisner Award for best finite/limited series in 1989, each comic book issue enjoying a print run of 200,000 copies.[110]

Art Books (1989–1995)
In between, Epic Comics did release four stand-alone art book titles, with Chaos and Metallic Memories reproducing most of the 1980 original:[66]

The Elsewhere Prince (1990)
While Giraud (with Lofficier) was only the co-writer of this US standard comic book mini series, which took place in "The Airtight Garage" universe, there was additional art from him featured in short accompanying editorials, as well as one to two page short stories.

Onyx Overlord (1992–1993)
By Giraud co-written sequel to The Elsewhere Prince, and like that series, also featuring additional art from his hand. While Giraud was very pleased with Shanower's art for The Elsewhere Prince for its "naive qualities" he found very fitting for the story-arc, he was deeply disappointed with Bingham's art for Onyx Overlord, considering the work of the "old comics veteran" uninspired and "truly undignified", suspecting Bingham did not like the work. Because of this, Giraud decided not to dispatch the already completed scenarios for Logs 5 and 6. Disappointing sales of the European editions left the cycle uncompleted indefinitely.[216]

Moebius' Airtight Garage (1993)
Standard US comic book reissue of the 1987 graphic novel, with some additional art in the editorials.

The Halo Graphic Novel (2006)
Comprising four chapters, Giraud provided the 16-page art for chapter 4, "Second Sunrise over New Mombasa". In the editorial of the novel (p. 99), Giraud explained that son Raphaël's enjoyment of the game series ultimately compelled him to accept an invitation to contribute his art; before penciling the story, he had never played the video games.

Graphitti Designs

Excepting The Art of Mœbius, Mœbius 9, Fusion (being Johnny-come-lately's, the latter two were released too late for inclusion, whereas the first one, having been a co-publication, could not for copyright reasons), The Silver Surfer and The Elsewhere Prince/Onyx Overlord, all these volumes were very shortly thereafter reissued by Graphitti Designs – having themselves added a volume to the Collected Fantasies series – as part of their signed and numbered, "Limited Hardcover Edition" 1500 copy each collection (in dust jacket), combining these with the similar Blueberry releases by Epic and Catalan Communications, in a single "Mœbius" ten-volume complete works anthology release. Excepting the last volume, the Mœbius collection was executed in the standard European graphic novel size.

Mœbius anthology collection (1988–1993)

Dark Horse

The Abyss (1989)
This mini comic book series, is the comic adaptation of the eponymous movie. The eight-page editorials in each are dedicated to the production design art Giraud had provided for the movie.

Concrete (1990)
This special in the Concrete comic book series, featured the first time, full color publication of the 23-page short story "The Still Planet", set in the Edena universe. Accounting for half the contents of the comic book, the story was instrumental in making Mœbius co-winner of the 1991 Eisner Award in the category "Best Single Issue".

City of Fire art portfolio (1993)
The fourth Mœbius outing of Dark Horse concerned a reissue of the art portfolio La Cité Feu – a collaborative art project of Giraud with Geoff Darrow – Starwatcher Graphics had released as an English language (for the introduction folio) "Limited american lux edition" version of 100 signed and numbered copies in January 1985 under its original title, alongside the French 950 copy original by Aedena.[217] Some of the art is reproduced in the aforementioned Fusion art book by Epic.

Mœbius collection (1996)
Having added the 0-volume to the Collected Fantasies series in 1990, Dark Horse Comics too decided to release a Mœbius specific – meaning without his Western work – collection themselves, this time executed in the standard US comic book-sized format and soliciting the editorial input from Jean-Marc Lofficier who had already done so for the previous efforts. Though much of the contents was essentially a recapitulation of the Marvel/Epic publications, Lofficier made use of the opportunity to add work Mœbius had created after the Marvel/Epic publications had run its course, such as the story The Man from the Ciguri (a sequel to The Airtight Garage) and the first two outings of the Madwomen of the sacred Heart series.

Mœbius Library (2016-)
Twenty years later, in April 2016, Dark Horse announced an ambitious project called the "Mœbius Library" to be released by its book division in American graphic novel hardcover format.[220] The stated intent was to predominantly publish latter day work by Mœbius in conjunction with, and originally published under the auspices of, his own publishing house "Mœbius Production", headed after his death in 2012 by second wife Isabelle. The first title was released in October 2016.

Kitchen Sink Press

Kitchen Sink Press was a renowned publisher of underground comics, explaining the French Ticklers series, and had connotations with HM Communications, adopting some of its artist after the latter had become defunct. Concurrently they had merged with Tundra Publishing in 1993, explaining the Visions of Arzach anthology art book.

French Ticklers (1989-1990)
A short-lived comic book series, collecting work from French underground comic artists, including Giraud. Giraud's contributions concerned some of his early "Mœbius" work he had produced for Hara-Kiri in 1963-1964. Graphitti Designs subsequently collected all early Mœbius work in their 1992 Collected Fantasies contribution as "Mœbius ½". All three black & white issues featured a (color) cover by Mœbius.

Legends of Arzach (1992)
This original American publication consists of six, 9.2"x12.2" sized, art portfolios, each of them containing an introduction plate, a by Giraud illustrated booklet featuring a short story by R.J.M. Lofficier, set in the Arzach universe, and eight art prints by American comic artists, paying homage to Mœbius' seminal character, 48 in total. Lofficier later expanded upon his short stories in his 2000 book title by iBOOKS, mentioned below.

"Visions of Arzach" (1993)
Original American art book publication with a new cover by Mœbius, collecting the art prints by American artists from Legends of Arzach with a few additions.

Various

"Buffalo Bill, Scout and Frontiersman" (1968)
Earliest known English book publication with art by Giraud, faithful reproduction of the French original.[29]

The Magic Crystal (1989–1990)
Executed as softcovers in the European graphic novel format.

"Eyes of the Cat" (1990)
For unknown reasons, this 54-page work had been left out of the Marvel/Epic collection of the 1980s–1990s, despite the fact that the work was hailed by comic critics as a graphic masterpiece. Still, the story did see a contemporary English-language publication, with elaborate annotations from its authors, in this graphic novel anthology. The black & white Mœbius story was as only one printed on yellow paper, like it was in the original French source publication. The anthology featured the rejected Les Chiens 1979 movie poster by Mœbius as cover.

The Mœbius Portfolio (1990)
By Lofficier coined section name (1 illustrated page) for the three Moebius contributions to this British graphic novel anthology, which consisted of "In the heart of the impregnable meta-bunker" (8 pages, first time English language publication), "Carnet 3: The Mœbius Sketchbook" (8 pages), and "Mœbius Circa '74" (8 pages). Giraud provided the promotional poster art for this outing, but not the cover.

Mœbius Collector Cards (1993)

"Mœbius: a retrospective" (1995)
A to 2500 copies limited exposition catalog for the similarly named exhibition at the Cartoon Art Museum, listed above.

Mœbius Comics (1996–1997)
Interior art executed in black & white, the series features a reprint of The Man from the Ciguri, but also new, and previously unseen Mœbius comics and art. Noteworthy are his storyboards for the abandoned Internal Transfer movie. Also featured in the series is a black & white version of the short story "The Still Planet", previously published in Concrete Celebrates Earth Day 1990, but this version sporting a different last page. J.M. Lofficier reprised his role as series editor for these comic book outings.

"Angel Claw" (1997)
Due to the graphic, erotic nature of the book, this work of Moebius has not been published in the US in the 1990s by the "usual suspects", but rather by outlier NBM Publishing under its "Eurotica" imprint, as a European A4 format hardcover in dust jacket book.

"The story of an idea" (2007)
A ten-page promotional brochure, featuring an eight-page comic by Giraud as Mœbius, detailing the history and aims of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. Especially created for the organization, the full color, standard US comic book sized, brochure was widely disseminated by the organization in French, English, Mandarin, Arabic and Spanish. The English language edition enjoyed a first print run of 48,000 copies, augmented with a 40,000 copy reprint run in May 2009.

XIII (2013)

iBOOKS

iBOOKS Inc. was a publishing imprint of Byron Preiss, who had previously been the editor-in-chief and co-publisher of the 1989 The Art of Mœbius book by Epic. Preiss incidentally, was also the editor-in-chief for the above-mentioned by Mœbius illustrated 1987 Project Pendulum science fiction novel.[141]

"Mœbius Arzach" (2000)

Icaro (2003–2004)

Humanoids Publishing

After the initial cooperation with DC Comics in the mid-2000s, publisher Humanoids, Inc. (until 2013 the US subsidiary of the French publisher co-founded by Moebius in 1974) has from 2010 onward begun to reissue new editions of Mœbius works on its own, starting with two of Mœbius's past collaborations with Alejandro Jodorowsky: The Incal and Madwoman of the Sacred Heart. Humanoids releases these latter-day hardcover editions, usually without dust jacket, in variant size formats, US graphic novel format (trade editions), oversized format (which is essentially the larger, standard European graphic novel A4 format), and the even larger coffee table format, the latter typically in a limited print run. Aside from the English language publications, Humanoids occasionally imports French deluxe, limited edition specialty Moebius editions, such as Le Garage hermétique (ISBN 9782731652253) and Arzach (ISBN 9782731634365), from the parent publisher especially on behalf of its American readership. The post-2010 Humanoids editions are also intended for, and disseminated to, the British-Canadian and UK markets, with the exception of two 2011 Incal editions, which were licensed and featured variant cover art.

The Metabarons (2002)
Giraud had created one 8-page short story "Au coeur de l'inviolable meta bunker" in 1989,[224] focusing on one of the major secondary characters from the Incal saga, The Metabaron, whose ancestry later received its own The Metabarons spin-off series. Though that story was redrawn by the series' artist Juan Giménez for later book publications, Giraud's original was published in black & white in the above-mentioned British publication, and subsequently included in an outing of Humanoids' "Prestige Format Comic Book" collection as "Metabaron 1: The Lost Pages", which introduced Valérie Beltran's new coloring for Giraud's Incal series.

Cover image of The Incal 2014 hardcover trade edition

The Incal (2005–2017)
Excepting the early 2005 co-productions with DC Comics, all subsequent editions feature the original coloring. The two co-editions with DC featured an entirely new coloring by Valérie Beltran as well as some censorship in regard to nudity, neither of which sitting well with writer Jodorowsky, who interpreted the changes as a cheap ploy to entice a younger readership.[225] Customer reviews for both titles on Amazon.com, showed that fans were largely in concordance with Jodorowsky's assessment. Considered a commercial failure, Beltran's coloring has never been used again after the initial (international) releases, be it in the United States or elsewhere in the world.

Madwoman of the Sacred Heart (2010–2013)
With the translation of volume 3 of the series, "The Sorbonne's Madman", these anthology collections complete the series.

"The Eyes of the Cat" (2011–2013)

"Angel Claws" (2013)
Essentially a reissue of he 1997 Eurotica title, but on this occasion issued without a dust jacket, using the plural for the title, and featuring a deviant cover.

Final Incal (2014)
Though this three-volume series (originally called Après l'Incal – After the Incal) was ultimately realized with art from José Ladrönn, Giraud had actually already penciled the first outing in the series, "Le nouveau rêve",[127] but which was replaced by a re-scripted and by Ladronn redrawn variant for reprint runs. The anthology editions below however, feature the Moebius 56-page original as well as a bonus. Actually, the series was from the start intended to be a purely Jodorowsky/Moebius follow-up to their acclaimed main series, but as stated above, it was Giraud who declined to continue afterwards.

Filmography

note: listed are only the feature length movie productions

Video games

Cover art for Fade to Black (left), and concept art for Pilgrim: Faith as a Weapon (right) by Mœbius.

Documentaries

Notes

  1. ↑ "On his part in the uprising at Pilote Giraud has said in 1974, 'It was shit, absolute shit...! I got ulcers at the publisher, they behaved horribly. They are all – and I weigh my words carefully – pigs and assholes. The way they treated their artists – who provided them with their bread and butter in the first place – was despicable, inexcusable. There was no social insurance, no pension arrangement, etc. I know people who wound up in unbearable circumstances, who were fired and ended up in dire straits... It was not a particularly bright thing to do on the publisher's part, they should have nurtured their stable of artists instead, if only for strategic reasons. In May 68 we, together with the union, convened a meeting for which we invited the responsible editors. But it was only Goscinny who showed up. There he stood, entirely alone, before an agitated mob who went after him, instead of conducting a dialog, discussing the problems. I was one of them, and ripped on him mercilessly. He was previously led to believe in private, that we all could come to some sort of arrangement together, and now he had to take all this abuse. There were even some guys who called him names and threatened him. Goscinny really found himself in an awful situation. He took it very hard, and I can not blame him, it was simply unjustified. I believe that he has never been able to put it behind him... We demanded answers, proposals, improvements from him. But you can not expect that from a man like Goscinny: Every attack hurt him deeply, had him choking on it, had him freeze...Ever since, Goscinny distrusted his co-workers, especially me, because I was the only representative of the Pilote team, whose interests I represented.'"[48]
  2. ↑ "On the impression Castaneda had left on him Giraud stated in 1975, "Alejandro gave me these books, and the reading was a great shock, a monumental shock. I was captivated, I discovered another live, a new way of thinking. It of course already landed in fertile ground, but because of Jodorowsky, all the more so. It was his way, by giving me these books, to influence me. One influences each other in daily work, one disagrees with each other. But with these books, he hit the nail on the head, these texts moved me to the core! And I let myself be affected. I find myself in a curious phase...I believe I'm on a turning point in my life. I experienced something alike when I read "Steppenwolf" of Hermann Hesse: I could then accept much of what I suppressed until then, or did not even acknowledge, even if they were fundamental truths in reality. In Castaneda's books, reality is constantly questioned – and that's shocking, earth-shattering. The same experience is possibly experienced when one reads the early Christian texts, or some other mystic text: Enlightenment can be found through anything, through Zen, Nazism even. I found it through Castaneda.[53]
  3. ↑ While the Blueberry authors have always treated Native-Americans with sympathy in their series, it was in the last series outing of 2007, "Apaches", that Giraud took his most outspoken stance in regard to the plight of Native-Americans. In the album – composed from Blueberry's Geronimo recollection segments as featured in the five-volume OK Corral story-arc – , Geronimo's son Dust is captive of the whites and imprisoned in a Native-American boarding school, headed by a misguided and puritanical parson, who ruthlessly tries to "civilize" his wards. Blueberry manages to free Dust and return him to his father, whereas the parson's sympathetic daughter is killed in the process, presented as a thinly veiled moral punishment for her father's wrongdoings. Though an anachronism in the comic, the boarding school is clearly patterned after the historical Carlisle Indian Industrial School, where cultural assimilation of Native Americans into white society was attempted, and the story stands out as Giraud's most outspoken condemnation in his main body of work of the white American's attempts to snuff out Native-American culture.
  4. ↑ On the inspiration for "The Word of Chief Seattle" Giraud has stated in 1989, "Trough a book from a young woman, Jeanine Fontaine, who had lived with Pilipino warriors. She cited the speech, as she was very touched by it. When I read it, it awoke an ancient anger within me, [the same anger as "Cauchemar Blanc" twenty years earlier], absolutely the same anger, the same outrage. And this is the extent of my political engagement. I take an emotional stance, when I'm deeply moved. Then I am unable to suppress the impulse to create a pamphlet!"[69]
  5. ↑ "Appel-Guéry encouraged Mœbius to tap into the more positive zones of his subconscious. 'Most of the people that were studying spirituality with Appel-Guéry did not know much about comics, but they immediately picked on the morbid, and overall negative feelings that permeated my work,' said Moebius. 'So I began to feel ashamed, and I decided to do something really different, just to show them that I could do it.'"[100]

References

  1. 1 2 3 An evening with “Moebius” A CTN exclusive special event (2010) on YouTube
  2. 1 2 3 4 Screech, Matthew. 2005. Moebius/Jean Giraud: Nouveau Réalisme and Science fiction. in Libbie McQuillan (ed) "The Francophone bande dessinée" Rodopi. p. 1
  3. 1 2 Screech, Matthew. 2005. "A challenge to Convention: Jean Giraud/Gir/Moebius" Chapter 4 in Masters of the ninth art: bandes dessinées and Franco-Belgian identity. Liverpool University Press. pp 95 – 128
  4. ↑ Comics Buyer's Guide #1485; 3 May 2002; Page 29
  5. ↑ De Weyer, Geert (2008). 100 stripklassiekers die niet in je boekenkast mogen ontbreken (in Dutch). Amsterdam / Antwerp: Atlas. p. 215. ISBN 978-90-450-0996-4.
  6. 1 2 3 "Biographie Mœbius", Whoswho.fr (in French)
  7. 1 2 3 4 Giraud has discussed his early life at length throughout the interview book Moebius: Entretiens avec Numa Sadoul. In the book his mother Pauline is also featured in her only known interview, relating events surrounding Giraud's earliest years such as the family's headlong flight from the German invaders during the tumultuous 1940 Blitzkrieg months, being bombed by Stukas along the way. (pp. 146–147). Whereas the relationship with his mother had been mended, Giraud also divulged that he had no memories of his absentee father Raymond, before the age of 15. (pp. 26–27)
  8. 1 2 3 Booker, Keith M. 2010. "Giraud, Jean" in Encyclopedia of Comic Books and Graphic Novels, Volume 1ABC-CLIO pp. 259–60
  9. ↑ de Bree, 1982, p. 13
  10. 1 2 3 4 Moliterni, Claude. "Interview met Giraud, tekenaar van Blueberry", Stripschrift, Zeist:Vonk, issue 39/40, March/April 1972, pp. 12-17, 39 (in Dutch); translated from the French original, published in Phénix, Paris:SRP Éditeur, issue 14, 1970/Q4.
  11. ↑ "page-Biographie". moebius.fr. 5 January 2011.
  12. ↑ Blueberry L'integrale 1, Paris: Dargaud 2012, p. 6, ISBN 9782205071238; As in so many other countries at the time, comics were considered by the conservative establishment as a perfidious influence on their youths, and the medium still had decades to go before it attained the revered status in French culture as "Le Neuvième Art" (the 9th art)
  13. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 150-154
  14. ↑ Bosser, 2005, p. 65
  15. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Moebius Redux: A Life in Pictures 2007 on YouTube
  16. 1 2 3 Giraud, Jean. "Introduction to King of the Buffalo by Jean Giraud". 1989. Moebius 9: Blueberry. Graphitti designs.
  17. 1 2 3 "Jean Giraud". Comiclopedia. Lambiek.
  18. ↑ "Jean Giraud makes own drawing strip". bpib.com. Retrieved 11 January 2017.; The in total four two-page short stories were published in Far West, issue 10, 14, 16 and 17, 1956. And while each of these stories have seen several reprints in side publications over the years, only one book publication is known to exist collecting all four at the same time in edited format alongside several other humorous Western comic shorts Giraud had created for Fleurus, the German language digest-sized comic book "Frank und Jeremie" (32 pages, Comic Verlagsgesellschaft, 1986, ISBN 3900390231).
  19. ↑ SCHTROUMPf, Les cahier de la bande dessinee, issue 25, Grenoble:Glénat Editions, 1974, pp. 38–39; These two stories, were the only serialized ones in any of he Fleurus magazines, running far longer than the 2-4 page shorts Giraud usually produced for the magazines. "Un géant chez lez Hurons" ran for 19 pages in Cœurs Valiants, issues 30-48, 1957, whereas "Le roi des bisons" ran for 10 pages in issues 29-38, 1958.
  20. ↑ Being all published in Cœurs Valiants, the by Guy Hempay written Art Howell stories included – besides the by Noël Carré written "Le roi des bisons" – , "Le retour de Spider Web" (3 pages, issue 49, 1957), "Stop à la caravane" (3 pages, issue 4, 1958), "Pas de dynamite pour le railway" (3 pages, issue 12, 1958), and "Le train fou" (3 pages, issue 38, 1959, also written by Giraud).
  21. 1 2 3 4 Two educational books, Hommes et cavernes (1957, OCLC 300051389), Amérique an mille (1959, OCLC 936885225), and one novel for girls, Sept filles dans la brousse (1958, OCLC 759796722)
  22. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 29-30
  23. ↑ de Bree, 1982, p. 11; While Jijé recognized the potential of Giraud, when the young men showed him their work, he was not impressed by that of Mézières, who had suggested the visit in the first place on behalf of his friend. Mézières however, was already taken under the wings of other Belgian comic grandmaster André Franquin, who ironically had been an earlier apprentice of Jijé.
  24. 1 2 3 4 5 Sadoul, 1991, pp. 31-33, 136-137
  25. 1 2 Sapristi!, issue 27, Dieppe:ANBD, Winter 1993, p. 77 (in French); Invariably overlooked by Giraud scholars (even by the otherwise thorough Sadoul – 2015, p. 23 – , who mistook a comment of the artist as referring to the later published Total Journal magazine), Bonux-Boy was a digest-sized marketing enticer for a French detergent of the same name, conceived by its marketing manager, Jijé's son Benoit Gillain. For Giraud however, it was nevertheless of seminal importance, as his work therein showed a marked progression over the work he had provided previously for Fleurus, indicating he had continued to work on his style during his military service, and which had been the main reason for Jijé to take on Giraud as an apprentice in the first place.
  26. ↑ Bosser, 2005, pp. 79-80
  27. 1 2 L'histoire des civilisations, Paris:Hachette, six volumes, 1961-1966, OCLC 796959351; Due to the fact that the featured pieces of art are not signed, it is very hard to ascertain which piece is from the hand of Giraud, and which is from Mézières' hand.
  28. ↑ Bosser, 2005, p. 76
  29. 1 2 3 "Buffalo Bill: Le roi des éclaireurs", (68 pages, Paris:Fernand Nathan, January 1968, OCLC 460432103), Bedetheque.com (in French); The book has seen several translations in other languages, including English.
  30. 1 2 3 Bouster, Patrick (3 July 2012). "Giraud-Moebius pour le disque: 33 tours et plus dans les étoiles", BDzoom.com (in French)
  31. 1 2 All published as pocket books in January 1979 by Librairie des Champs-Élysées, Paris, the titles are, #1:Sans pitié! (ISBN 2702408354), #2:Dans les griffes du dragon (ISBN 2702408362), #3:Le colt et l'étoile (ISBN 2702408370), #4:Ku-Klux-Klan (ISBN 2702408389), #5:Pour l'honneur d'un copain (ISBN 2702408672), #6:Le convoi infernal (ISBN 2702408664), and #7:La piste des Kiowas (ISBN 2702408656).
  32. 1 2 "Gir œuvres, "Tome 2: Le tireur solitaire"" (110 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés, May 1983, ISBN 2731602317), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  33. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, p. 86
  34. ↑ "Hélène Giraud", IMDb.com
  35. ↑ "Claudine Giraud", stripINFO.be (in Dutch)
  36. ↑ "The Apple Pie", Pharagonesia & Other Strange Stories & story notes; Claudine Giraud wrote the story for the feminist comic magazine fr:Ah ! Nana, a sister publication of Métal hurlant and where she worked as a magazine editor at the time. Originally published in black & white in issue 2, 1977, she colored the story herself for the 1987 American publication.
  37. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, p. 130
  38. 1 2 "The Detour", Arzach & Other Fantasy Stories & editorial notes; First published in the Pilote Annuel 74 of November 1973, the only originally black & white short story not colored for the 1987 American publication.
  39. 1 2 3 "Gir" (30 pages, Paris:Futuropolis, January 1974, OCLC 40720672), Bedetheque.com (in French); black & white, also containing, besides the 7-page "La Déviation", a selection of science fiction illustrations made for OPTA.
  40. ↑ It was the first outing of the series that has seen the very first known English-language publication of Giraud art as the similarly named "Fort Navajo" in the British weekly comic magazine Valiant (ComicVine; IPC Magazines), starting its edited and truncated black & white run in issue 15 May 1965 through issue 21 August 1965, fifteen issues in total. Still, excepting the 1968 history book Buffalo Bill, Scout and Frontiersman, it would take until 1977 with the advent of Heavy Metal and the first four British Blueberry books by Methuen, for additional work to see English publication.
  41. ↑ Brouard, Jean-Yves (2004). "Blueberry", jmcharlier.com (in French)
  42. ↑ Close friend Mézières, like Giraud passionate about Westerns and the Far West, took it up a notch, when he too left at about the same time for the United States, actually working as a cowboy for two years, albeit not in the South-West, but rather in the North-West.
  43. ↑ Ratier, Gilles (27 March 2012). "Pour se souvenir de Jean Giraud (alias Gir ou Moebius)...", BDzoom.com (in French)
  44. 1 2 3 Jean-Marc Lofficier. 1989. "The Past Master", in Moebius 5: Blueberry. Graphitti designs.
  45. 1 2 Booker Keith M. 201. "Blueberry" in Encyclopedia of comic books and graphic novels, Volume 2. ABC-CLIO. p. 69
  46. ↑ Dargaud archive: "C'est en 1963 qu'est créé ce personnage pour PILOTE par Charlier et Giraud."
  47. ↑ Booker Keith M. 201. "Western Comics" in Encyclopedia of comic books and graphic novels, Volume 2. ABC-CLIO. p. 691
  48. 1 2 Sadoul, 1991, pp. 33-34; The revolt at Pilote had an indirect and unintended side-effect, after the publisher had started to initiate changes on the editorial level. Like Goscinny, Jean-Michel Charlier was conservative in nature and felt ill at ease with the modernization, causing him to leave Dargaud as early as 1972 to pursue a career as documentary maker for French television, though he continued to provide scenarios for the artist of his comics, including Blueberry (Ratier, 2013, pp. 226-227).
  49. 1 2 Morales, Thomas (February 22, 2015). "La BD fait sa révolution / Comics make their revolution". Causeur.fr (in French). Archived from the original on May 9, 2017. Retrieved May 27, 2017.
  50. ↑ Svane, 2003, p. 43
  51. 1 2 de Bree, 1982, p. 24
  52. ↑ de Bree, 1982, pp. 22-24
  53. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 39-40
  54. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 39-45
  55. 1 2 3 Burns, Mal; Friedrich, Mike (Winter 1978–1979). "Gir/Mœbius: Interview met Jean Giraud". Striprofiel (in Dutch) (36). Assen: Uitgeverij De Meulder. pp. 19–21.; Interviewer Friedrich double-checked with Les Humanoïdes Associés publishing editor Jean-Pierre Dionnet, and was told that a Mœbius album did 40,000-50,000 copies per title at the time, contrary to the 10,000 Giraud claimed.
  56. 1 2 3 4 Fuéri, Jean-Pierre (November 1999). "Au nom du père, du fils et de St Blueberry". BoDoï (in French) (24). Paris: LZ Publications. pp. 35–36, 38.
  57. ↑ Svane, 2003, p 35; Sadoul, 2015, p. 220
  58. ↑ de Bree, 1982, pp. 23, 41-43
  59. ↑ Svane, 2003, p. 69
  60. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, pp. 220-226
  61. ↑ Jean-Marc Lofficier. 1989. "Gone with the Wind Revisited", in Moebius 9: Blueberry. Graphitti designs.
  62. ↑ Frederiks, Hans. "Een gespleten tekenaar...", Stripschrift, issue 135/136, Zeist: Vonk, June 1980, pp. 33-34 (in Dutch); Giraud made this remark shortly before the spectacular upsurge in popularity of Blueberry, additionally having stated that he only re-embarked on Blueberry because he needed the money to buy a house in Paris. In later life, Giraud has watered down the prosaic statement, claiming he only made this comment because he tired of having to explain himself over and over again at the time.
  63. ↑ Pasamonik, Didier (16 March 2005). "Avec «Dust», Moebius s’empare de Blueberry", Actuabd.com (in French)
  64. 1 2 3 de Bree, 1982, pp. 12-13
  65. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, p. 26
  66. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Moebius" (146 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés, January 1980, ISBN 2731600004), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  67. 1 2 Gir œuvres: "Tome 1, Le lac des émeraudes", (132 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés, January 1981, ISBN 2731600977), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions. Several of the short stories have seen English translations in various outings of Epic's 1980s publication effort.
  68. 1 2 Frederiks, 1982, p. 79
  69. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 77-78
  70. ↑ First published in Tintin Super 5: "Spécial western" (80 pages, Brussels:Le Lombard, April 1979), published in English in the 1981 "Mœbius" book from HM Communications, but not in any of the 1980s Epic publications.
  71. 1 2 3 4 "Made in L.A." (136 pages, Tournai:Casterman, September 1988, ISBN 2203346019), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  72. 1 2 "Le bandard fou" (54 pages, Paris:Les Éditions du Fromage, 1974, no ISBN), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions
  73. ↑ Frederiks, 1982, pp. 82-84
  74. ↑ Le Blog des Humanoïdes Associés: Adieu Mœbius, merci Mœbius
  75. 1 2 Lofficier, Jean-Marc (December 1988). "Moebius". Comics Interview (64). Fictioneer Books. pp. 24–37.
  76. 1 2 3 4 Taboo 4, 1990, p. 32
  77. ↑ "Breasts and Beasts: Some Prominent Figures in the History of Fantasy Art." 2006. Dalhousie University
  78. 1 2 Arzach, stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  79. ↑ de Bree, 1982, p. 20; Giraud mellowed somewhat at a later point in time, and some Mœbius work from his Tahiti period did appear in Pilote issues m120, 1984 and m133, 1985.
  80. 1 2 "Arzach & Other Fantasy Stories", 1987, story notes
  81. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, p. 100
  82. ↑ Grove, Laurence. 2010. Comics in French: the European bande dessinée in context Berghahn Books p. 46
  83. ↑ de Bree, 1982, p. 87
  84. ↑ Taboo 4, 1990, pp. 86-87
  85. 1 2 Taboo 4, 1990, pp. 84
  86. ↑ de Bree, 1982, pp. 9, 88
  87. ↑ "Les yeux du chat" (54 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés], March 1978, ISBN 2902123531), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  88. ↑ de Bree, 1982, p. 88
  89. 1 2 "Les yeux du chat", stripINFO.be (in Dutch), includes other language editions.
  90. ↑ Taboo 4, 1990, pp. 88
  91. ↑ "Les années Métal Hurlant" (420 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés, October 2010, ISBN 9782731623055), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  92. 1 2 "Moebius œuvres complètes, Tome 4: La Complainte de l'Homme Programme" (102 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés, April 1982, ISBN 2731601558), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  93. 1 2 "Moebius œuvres complètes, Tome 5: Le Désintégré Réintégré" (106 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés, January 1984, ISBN 2731602740), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  94. ↑ Moebius œuvres complètes, Bedetheque.com (in French)
  95. ↑ de Bree, 1982, pp. 21-22
  96. 1 2 De avonturen van John Difool, stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  97. ↑ de Bree, 1982, p. 19
  98. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 52-59
  99. 1 2 De wereld van Edena, stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  100. ↑ Randy Lofficier and Jean-Marc Lofficier, Moebius Comics No. 1, Caliber Comics, 1996.
  101. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 59–69
  102. 1 2 "La nuit de l'étoile" (48 pages, Paris:Aedena, May 1986, ISBN 2905035250), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  103. 1 2 "La memoire du futur" (96 pages, Paris:Gentiane, November 1983, ISBN 2904300031, later retitled "Starwatcher", Paris:Aedena, February 1986, ISBN 290503520X), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  104. 1 2 "Venise celeste", (102 pages, Paris:Aedena, September 1988, ISBN 2905035013), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  105. 1 2 "Altor", stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  106. 1 2 "La parapsychologie et vous" (154 pages, Paris:Éditions Albin Michel, February 1980, ISBN 2226009272), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  107. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 53-55
  108. ↑ "Gentiane", stripINFO.be (in Dutch)
  109. ↑ "Aedena", stripINFO.be (in Dutch)
  110. 1 2 3 4 Sadoul, 1991, pp. 69–71
  111. 1 2 "Starwatcher Graphics, Inc.", Bestbusinessca.com
  112. ↑ O'Neill, Patrick Daniel. "The Wild [French] West", Comics Scene, issue 9, pp. 8–12, 68, Mt. Morris: Starlog Group, Inc., 1989
  113. ↑ R.J.M. Lofficier: "Before Nick Fury, There was... Lieutenant Blueberry", Marvel Age, issue 79, October 1989.
  114. ↑ ComicsAlliance.com
  115. ↑ "Temporary Residence", pwc.com
  116. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, p. 62
  117. 1 2 "Fusions" (126 pages, Tournai: Casterman, April 1995, ISBN 2203346051), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other languge editions.
  118. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 67-68
  119. ↑ Sadoul, 1991, pp. 75-76, 85
  120. 1 2 3 4 "Blueberry's" (76 pages, Paris:Stardom, March 1997, ISBN 2908706024), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  121. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, introduction, pp. 52, 207, 244-246
  122. ↑ "Claire Champeval", stripINFO.be (in Dutch)
  123. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, p. 212
  124. ↑ "Mockba - carnet de bord", (53 folios, Paris:Stardom, ISBN 2908766000), Bedetheque.fr (in French)
  125. ↑ "Stardom" & "Moebius Productions", stripINFO.be (in Dutch)
  126. ↑ "Moebius Productions", Moebius.fr (in French); official site
  127. 1 2 3 Après l'Incal: "Tome 1, Le nouveau rêve" (56 pages, Paris:Les Humanoides Associés, 2000/11, ISBN 2731614250}), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  128. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, p. 227
  129. 1 2 XIII: "Tome 18, La version Irlandaise" (48 pages, Paris:Dargaud, November 2007, ISBN 9782505001317), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  130. ↑ Libiot, Eric (4 January 2007). "Giraud s'aventure dans XIII" (in French). L'Express.
  131. ↑ Lestavel, François (18 December 2012). "Yves Sente et Jean Van Hamme: le succès en série" (in French). Paris Match.
  132. 1 2 Arzak: "L'Arpenteur" (64 pages, Paris:Moebius Productions/Glénat, August 2010, ISBN 9782908766585), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  133. 1 2 Major Fatal, "Chasseur déprime" (56 pages, Paris:Stardom, May 2008, ISBN 9782908766479), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  134. 1 2 "Major" (312 pages, Paris:Moebius Productions, March 2011, ISBN 9782908766653), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  135. 1 2 "La faune de Mars" (96 pages, Paris:Moebius Productions, March 2011, ISBN 9782908766660), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  136. 1 2 3 4 Boucher, Geoff (2 April 2011). "Moebius on his art, fading eyesight and legend: ‘I am like a unicorn’". LATimes.com.
  137. ↑ "Giraud Moebius, Artvalue.com (in French)
  138. ↑ "Docteur Gir & Mister Moebius", Gazette-Drouot.com (in French)
  139. ↑ "Jean Giraud Moebius", stripINFO.be (in Dutch); auction catalog.
  140. ↑ Svane, 2003, p. 33; Sadoul, 2015, pp. 110-112, 244
  141. 1 2 3 "Project Pendulum" (200 pages, New York City:Walker & Company, September 1987, ISBN 0802767125), Alphabettenthletter.blogspot.nl (in English)
  142. 1 2 "L'Alchimiste" (220 pages, Paris:Editions Anne Carrière, November 1994, ISBN 291018837X), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  143. 1 2 "Ballades" (108 pages, Paris:fr:Vertige Graphic, October 1995, ISBN 290898119X), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  144. ↑ "Une cheval en hiver."; six page short story published in Pilote, issue 550, May 1970, as one of the earliest published comic creations of the artist.
  145. 1 2 Jason Muller: "Récits des temps post-atomiques!" (44 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés, October 1975, OCLC 123029103, parts previously published in Pilote, issue 558, 1970 and issues 635 & 649, 1972), stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  146. 1 2 Sadoul, 2015, p. 215
  147. ↑ "Première période (avant 1967)". Tout (ou presque) sur Jean-Claude Mézières... Archived from the original on 20 September 2005. Retrieved 20 September 2006.
  148. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Sadoul, 1991, pp. 66-68, 100-111
  149. ↑ Grove, Laurence. 2010. Comics in French: the European bande dessinée in context Berghahn Books p. 211
  150. ↑ Scanlon, Paul; Gross, Michael (1979). The Book of Alien. New York City: HM Communications, Inc. p. 112. ISBN 0930368436.
  151. 1 2 3 Minovitz, Ethan (11 March 2012). "French cartoonist Jean "Moebius" Giraud dies at 73". Big Cartoon News. Retrieved 11 March 2012.
  152. ↑ de Bree, 1982, pp. 24-25
  153. 1 2 "Les maîtres du temps" (38 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés, 1982/01, ISBN 2731601590), Bedetheque.com (in French)
  154. ↑ "Arnie Wong", IMDb.com
  155. 1 2 "Little Nemo", stripINFO.be (in Dutch); includes other language editions.
  156. ↑ Svane, 2003, p. 42
  157. ↑
  158. ↑ "Strange Frame: Love & Sax", IMDb.com
  159. ↑ "Cauchemar blanc Awards", IMDb.com
  160. ↑ "Thru the Moebius Strip" & "Arzak Rhapsody", IMDb.com
  161. ↑ Collective (1986). L'univers de 1: Gir. Paris: Dargaud. p. 85. ISBN 2205029452.
  162. ↑ "La planète encore", IMDb.com
  163. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, pp. 248-251
  164. ↑ Breuillier, Jean-François (November 1995). "Interview de Jean Giraud". Arthaud BD News (in French) (1). Grenoble: Arthaud Grenette. pp. 2–4.
  165. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, p. 217
  166. 1 2 3 "9e Festival BD de Solliès-Ville", festival guide 1997, p. 42 (in French); standard European graphic novel sized softcover.
  167. ↑ Official website on the Miyazaki-Moebius exhibition at La Monnaie, Paris
  168. ↑ "Catalogue de l'exposition Blueberry", stripINFO.be (in Dutch)
  169. ↑ Museum web page for exhibition, Retrieved 2 February 2013.
  170. 1 2 "Mœbius transe forme", stripINFO.be (in Dutch)
  171. ↑ Hachereau, Dominique. "BD – Bande Dessinee et Philatelie" (in French). Retrieved 18 July 2009.
  172. ↑ "Expo GIR et MOEBIUS", BDParadiso.com (in French)
  173. ↑ "Blueberry au bord du Nervous break-down...", BDParadisio.com (in French)
  174. ↑ "Jean Giraud sur un scénario de Jean-Michel Charlier", BDParadisio.com (in French)
  175. ↑ "Moebius – Jean Giraud – Video del Maestro all' opera" on YouTube. 30 May 2008
  176. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, pp. 114-116, 208-212
  177. ↑ Svane, 2003, p. 12
  178. ↑ Hamel, Ian (10 March 2012). "Décès à Paris du dessinateur et scénariste de BD Moebius", Le Point.fr (in French); Connelly, Brendon (10 March 2012). "Moebius, aka Jean Girard, aka Gir, Has Passed Away", Bleeding Cool.com; "Jean Giraud alias Moebius, père de Blueberry, s'efface", Libération.fr, 9 March 2012 (in French)
  179. 1 2 "French ‘master of comics’ artist Moebius dies", Euronews.com. 10 March 2012.
  180. ↑ "L’enterrement de Jean Giraud, alias Moebius, aura lieu à Paris le 15 mars", Frencesoir.fr (in French)
  181. 1 2 L’Adieu à Moebius. Actuabd.com (in French)
  182. 1 2 3 "Comic book artist Moebius dies". Jakarta Globe. 11 March 2012
  183. ↑ Arzak marque de Giraud, marques.expert (in French)
  184. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, p. 238
  185. ↑ Histoire de mon double, Bedetheque.com (in French)
  186. ↑ "dBD HS 09: Hommage à Giraud-Moebius", Actuabd.com (in French)
  187. ↑ Bordenave, Julie. "Miyazaki Moebius : coup d'envoi". AnimeLand.com. Retrieved 18 May 2008.
  188. ↑ Ghibli Museum (ed.). Ghibli Museumdiary 2002-08-01 (in Japanese). Tokuma Memorial Cultural Foundation for Animation. Retrieved 18 May 2008.
  189. ↑ "Miyazaki and Moebius". Nausicaa.net. Retrieved 29 April 2013.
  190. ↑ "R.I.P. Jean 'Moebius' Giraud (1938–2012) – ComicsAlliance | Comic book culture, news, humor, commentary, and reviews". ComicsAlliance. 22 April 2013. Archived from the original on 19 June 2012. Retrieved 29 April 2013.
  191. 1 2 "Did Blade Runner influence William Gibson when he wrote his cyberpunk classic, Neuromancer?". brmovie.com Archived 9 December 2013 at the Wayback Machine.
  192. ↑ "Remebering Moebius", journal.neilgaiman.com, 10 March 2012
  193. ↑ Italian television interview cited in Mollica, Vincenzo (2002), Fellini mon ami, Paris: Anatolia, 84.
  194. ↑ Phénix was a specialized comic journal, published quarterly between 1966 and 1977 by Parisian publisher SRP Éditeur, and has been one of the oldest of its kind in the world (Bedetheque.com).
  195. ↑ "11° Salone Internationale del Comics, del Film di Animazione e dell'Illustrazione" (in Italian). immaginecentrostudi.org.
  196. ↑ Zack, issue 4, Koralle, 1979
  197. ↑ "14° Salone Internationale del Comics, del Film di Animazione e dell'Illustrazione" (in Italian). immaginecentrostudi.org.
  198. ↑ noosfere.org. "Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire" (in French).
  199. ↑ "Jean Giraud: Bibliographie, Photo, Biographie", BDparadiso.com (in French); Received from Culture Minister of France, Jack Lang
  200. ↑ Jean Giraud (Gir, Moebius) est mort, Voici.fr (in French):Awarded in person by President of France François Mitterrand, uncle of Frédéric Mitterrand.
  201. 1 2 3 "Giraud, Jean ('Moebius')". The Locus Index to SF Awards: Index of Art Nominees. Locus Publications. Retrieved 11 April 2013.
  202. 1 2 "Moebius", Prix-Littéraires.net (in French)
  203. ↑ ""Science Fiction Hall of Fame"". Archived from the original on 21 July 2011. Retrieved 21 July 2011.. [Quote: "EMP is proud to announce the 2011 Hall of Fame inductees: ..."]. May/June/July 2011. EMP Museum (empmuseum.org). Archived 21 July 2011. Retrieved 2013-03-19.
  204. ↑ Comixtrip.fr; Received from Higher Education Minister of France Laurent Wauquiez on November 24, 2011
  205. ↑ "La ferme de animaux" (48 pages, Brussels:fr:Novedi, March 1985, ISBN 280390022X, after George Orwell's famed novel and serving as a probation piece before Bati embarked on The Magic Crystal), stripINFO.be (in Dutch), includes other language editions.
  206. ↑ "La Fleur du désert", (224 pages, Paris:Gallimard, October 1976, ISBN 2070294749), Gallimard.fr (in French)
  207. ↑ "Heavy Metal Special Editions #1 - Moebius", Grand Comics Database
  208. ↑ De verzamelde werken van Mœbius, stripINFO.be (in Dutch); Includes all language editions.
  209. ↑ "Moebius 0: The Horny Goof and Other Underground Stories #0", Grand Comic Database
  210. ↑ "Moebius #1 - Upon a Star", Grand Comic Database
  211. ↑ "Moebius #2 - Arzach & Other Fantasy Stories", Grand Comic Database
  212. ↑ "Moebius #4 - The Long Tomorrow & Other Science Fiction Stories", Grand Comic Database
  213. ↑ "Moebius #5 - The Gardens of Aedena", Grand Comic Database
  214. ↑ "Moebius #6 - Pharagonesia & Other Strange Stories", Grand Comic Database
  215. ↑ "Moebius #7 - The Goddess", Grand Comic Database
  216. ↑ Sadoul, 2015, p. 228
  217. ↑ (AUT) Giraud/Mœbius - Le Para-BD, Bedetheque.com (in French)
  218. ↑ "Moebius: Exotics", Grand Comic Database
  219. ↑ "Moebius: H.P.'s Rock City", Grand Comic Database
  220. ↑ "Mœbius Library Debuts This Fall", publisher's blog 04/07/2016
  221. ↑ "French Ticklers #1", Grand Comic Database
  222. ↑ "French Ticklers #2", Grand Comic Database
  223. ↑ "French Ticklers #3", Grand Comic Database
  224. ↑ Original publication in the Incal side publication Les mystères de l'Incal (64 pages, Paris:Les Humanoïdes Associés, 1989/11, ISBN 2731607025), in the original coloring. (in French)
  225. ↑ Joe Mcculloch (August 24, 2011). ""I Feel Myself Like a Genius and a Sacred Whore": A Few Questions for Alejandro Jodorowsky". The Comics Journal. Retrieved October 25, 2016.
  226. ↑ BLUEBERRY'S - JEAN "Moebius" GIRAUD on YouTube
  227. ↑ Jean Giraud "Moebius" and Jean Claude Mezieres art concept in Fifth Element on YouTube

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