André Franquin
André Franquin [ ɑndʁe fʁɒŋkɛ ] ( born January 3, 1924 in Etterbeek, Brussels, † January 5, 1997 in Nice ) was a francophone Belgian illustrator and author. He is best known series such as Spirou and Fantasio, Mausi and Paul, Gaston and Black thought and as the creator of the Marsupilami. André Franquin applies not only to Hergé as the main character defining comic artists in Europe. His expressive drawing style is marked by sweeping lines and detail. The humor often wears anarchist trains.
Training
After a year of training at the Ecole Saint- Luc Saint -Gilles Franquin worked as an animator at the studio CBA. In this work he learned later comic book artist - colleagues such as Morris, Peyo, René Follet and Eddy Paape know. From 1946 he worked for the publishing house Dupuis, who published the comic magazine Spirou. Franquin initially designed the cover of Dupuis magazine " Le Moustique " and found in Jijé (Joseph Gillain ), then the most important artist of the publishing house, a fatherly friend, who took him under his wing.
Spirou and Fantasio
It soon took over Franquin the title of the Journal de Spirou series. It had been created in 1938 by Rob - Vel (Robert Velter ) and briefly in 1940, and continued from 1943 Jijé, who added the figure Fantasio. Under Franquin, the series Spirou and Fantasio has become one of the great comic classic and received her still valid today face: resembled his early episodes from the forties still quite strong which his master Jijé to Franquin ventured from 1950 to the figures of albums long adventures which were the two main characters in a much more cohesive universe. There they had henceforth to do it with a variety of recurring supporting characters, including the eccentric Count von Rummel Village, the sneaky Zantafio, the megalomaniac Zyklotrop and the emancipated Steffani. To the two most important figures Franquin's Marsupilami the fantasy creatures and the creative slob Gaston Lagaffe, who was also an office boy by the way and acted independently of Spirou from the beginning developed. The Marsupilami made his first appearance in Spirou on January 31, 1952 Gaston made his debut on 28 February 1957.
1950 married Franquin: with his wife Liliane - caricatured in many Spirou adventures and a Gaston- gag - he had a daughter Isabelle, who was born in 1957 ( nine days before the first appearance of Gaston ). The marriage lasted until the death of the artist.
After a dispute with the publisher Dupuis Franquin Spirou undertook to draw a series for the competing magazine Tintin. From 1955 to 1959 so the one-pager created by Mausi and Paul ( Modeste et Pompon ), which today mainly because of their sophisticated fifties aesthetic feature in addition to their comedy without them ever was granted the big breakthrough. After all, the series was successful enough to be continued by other artists such as Dino Attanasio. Franquin's dispute with Dupuis, however, was soon settled, and he was in the dilemma that he was now at two publishing houses under contract.
Gaston
From the end of 1957 was Gaston, who had been published only in the form of individual illustrations, a private Gag semiconductor in the magazine. A guest appearance was Gaston in the Spirou story " La Foire Aux Gangster " ( " meeting place fairground "). Another less known Franquin creation was the end of 1957 Little Nicky (Le petit Noël ) who experienced some shorter solo adventure, occurred in Marsupilami - gags, and also appeared in picture book form. Noël and Elaoin experienced another adventure in 1986. Along with Will Franquin created the children's book " Pierres Happy Easter ", which the short comic " Happy Easter, my little Noël " was based.
Franquin had to look after three series from 1957, designed the cover and illustrated plus an additional booklet content. Despite the support of assistants, including background artist Jidéhem and lyricist Greg, he suffered a collapse in December 1961. Franquin had a severe depression, jaundice was added yet. It was not until 1963 he was working on the aborted Spirou and Fantasio adventure QRN calls Bretzelburg continue. It was followed by two more stories that strongly reminded in their Gagbezogenheit Gaston until Franquin the series in 1968 finally gave up completely and with the 18th album The Gold makers to Jean -Claude Fournier relinquished to devote himself entirely to his office messenger can. At the same time he stepped off the rights to all of his created characters of the series to the publisher Dupuis. The rights to the characters of the Marsupilami and Gaston Lagaffe he retained however. Both series led Franquin on. In the album " The alchemist " he was once again the Marsupilami, which occurred last time in a Spirou story. He did this for two reasons: firstly, to facilitate Fournier his successor, on the other hand, because he was of the opinion that Fournier had the character of the Marsupilami not sufficiently taken into account in its design.
The Antiheldentum Gaston took from the beginning a great influence on the European comic strips, and so his office experiences in 1966 extended to the right to a full page. Already at the stage of semiconductor Franquin, similar to Spirou, the title character had provided a wealth of delicious supporting characters to the side, including the irascible businessman Bruchmüller, the treacherous traffic cops Knusel and intimately in love with Gaston secretary Miss Trudel. The figure Demel replaced in 1968 as Fantasio Gaston's superiors, which led the series to be completely independent of Spirou. Overall, Gaston one of the most personal series of comic history, with its creator, looking back in the title character saw a self-portrait.
From the late seventies, Franquin devoted increasingly socially critical topics to which he made his figures refer. He criticized on a Gaston- page human rights violations and torture. Furthermore, he stressed the importance of nature and animal protection, for which the figure of the animal fond Gaston was ideal in his comics. From 1975 to 1985 Franquin was involved in the scenario for the Will (Willy Maltaite ) drawn series Isabella.
Black thoughts
Still plagued by depression, he drew from 1977 the number of black thoughts that appeared in the magazine supplement Trombone Illustré. The only short time published, with Yvan Delporte produced by Franquin supplement contributed significantly to the development of modern European comics for adults. After the end of the Trombone Illustré ( October 1977) the blacks thought appeared to the end of 1982 in the magazine " Fluide Glacial ". The sardonic and time-sensitive, black / white held gags came to a major work by the artist. The Black thought it was short gags that just so dripping with macabre humor.
Developed in 1978 with Franquin Delporte the comic book series " Arnest Ringard " ("The quarrels of Ernest poker and mole Ottokar "). Drawn was the series of ( Frédéric ) Jannin, the texts were from Franquin.
In 1980, Franquin the Grand Prize of the Swedish Academy of Comic Art. A year later, he created Jidéhem and Delporte the narrative novel " Robinson on rails" with Spirou, Fantasio and Gaston in the lead roles. Was illustrated adventure with large-format images. 1982 Franquin's albums reached the 10 million mark.
From 1982 to 1985 Franquin could not work because of his severe depression. In the irregular character style of the incurred from 1986 last Gaston- pages, the changing state of mind Franquin reflects: in some gags quiet, almost carefully drawn lines, which make the dynamics miss earlier times, in other gags an apparently herrührender of depression and illness seizures trembling, " klecksiger " style.
As Franquin had retained the rights to the character of the Marsupilami, he sat in 1987 for the artist Batem The Adventures of Marsupilami in scene. Among the various writers of the show were Greg and especially Yann, who contributed the best scenario. Overall quite undervalued, the series was able to reach their full potential by the relative narrowness of the title character, however, never. Ironically, the Marsupilami acted in his own series often as a minor character, which faced resistance at the Spirou fans who are still waiting, that the sympathetic animal returns in the series. The rights for the Marsupilami were temporarily at Disney, but Franquin acquired the rights back because he was upset that the Disney corporation had completely changed the concept.
At a dusky black thoughts completely contrary late work came Tifous 1990, three cheerful, created for television Irrwichtel, of which an album with sketches ( inter alia for the screenplay ) was born.
André Franquin died two days after his 73rd birthday on the night of 4 to 5 January 1997 Nice to heart failure.
Franquin's wife Liliane died on January 28, 2007.
Aftereffect
André Franquin is now on a par with the big comic artists like Carl Barks and Hergé. He influenced an entire signatory generations in France and Belgium. When asked which artists and comics influence him, Franquin Popeye, Walt Disney, and Snuffy Smith Jijé stated. For his work he received in many countries in Europe and America Awards. 1974, the artist was the first winner of the prestigious Grand Prix de la Ville d' Angoulême, awarded at the Festival International de la Bande Dessinée d' Angoulême, and finished in 2005 even the 16th in a survey of the most important Walloon Belgians of all time.