Franquin, we read in the Comics Encyclopedia, was:
'Born in Etterbeek in 1924... [T]he young Franquin showed an early talent for drawing and studied at the Institut Saint-Luc in Saint-Gilles for one year. Shortly after leaving school, he took a part-time job in the animation studios Compagnie Belge d'Actualités (C.B.A.), ... After the closing of this studio, ... Jijé paved the way for him and [their friend] Morris to work for the ...publisher, Éditions Dupuis. During this period, Franquin also made illustrations for the scouting magazine Plein Jeu.
'Franquin, together with Morris ... went to work in Jijé's house in Waterloo, .... Besides Jijé, Franquin was also influenced by artists like Hergé, Floyd Gottfredson, Harvey Kurtzman, E.C. Segar, Georges Beuville, Chic Young, Tex Avery, Hokusai, Charles M. Schulz and Ronald Searle. Franquin started out making (cover) illustrations for the Dupuis magazines Le Moustique and Bonnes Soirées... He ....moved on to create stories on his own, like 'Le Tank' (1946), 'L'Héritage' (1946) and 'Radar le Robot' (1947), all still heavily influenced by Jijé and his animation background.
'In 1948 and 1949 he accompanied Jijé and Morris on a trip through the USA and Mexico, [Soon he] began making longer stories, starting with 'Il y a un Sorcier à Champignac' in 1950-51, and introduced a great variety of new side-characters to the strip. ...[One] old nobleman is a part-time scientist, inventor and owner of a mushroom plantation. He functions as the genius but absent-minded professor of the franchise ... [Another] character was notable because she was an attractive female in a time when most children's comics magazines shied away from using sexy women. Not only that: Seccotine actually had a colourful personality. She wasn't just a damsel in distress or platonic love interest, but worked as an independent journalist. While she was overall nice and enthusiastic, she could easily get agitated when feeling offended and slap people in the face.
....
'In 1955, after a dispute with his publisher Dupuis, Franquin headed to competitor Lombard, and signed a five-year contract to work for Tintin magazine. Thus began Franquin's first venture into the comic gag strip, 'Modeste et Pompon', which was first published on 19 October 1955. The series follows the trials and tribulations of a young man, Modeste, and his cute girlfriend, Pompon. Modeste is short-tempered and often overestimates his abilities, which brings him into frequent trouble....
'This first experience of a gag strip led to the creation of his iconic 'Gaston Lagaffe' character on 28 February 1957. Drawn from the template of the American beatnik, the character initially caused amoc in the magazine's editorial sections. He simply just appeared in the pages without any title or explanation. ...., which led to the popularization of the anti-hero in European comics. After a few weeks, Franquin started featuring Gaston in half-page gags, which were mostly drawn by his assistant Jidéhem. From its start as a strip with mainly office humor in the early years, to the hilarious and over-the-top happenings in later years: Gaston's antics have enjoyed generations of comic book readers, with new gags appearing until the 1990s.
'..... Much had to do with the fact that Gaston's laziness, clumsiness and overall stupidity always ended in hilarious over-the-top disaster. ...
'.... Although the strip ran for over 30 years, Gaston's superiors never managed to actually get him to work. While he had only one thing to do: sort the mail! Gaston spent most of his time sleeping behind his desk. But at least then he was somewhat harmless. Whenever Gaston was awake he would spent all his energy on crafting mad inventions, of which the extraordinary Gaffophone is the most notorious. Most of his experiments ended in unexpected accidents, explosions, collapsing walls or other bodily harm. The young employee also frequently brought stuff and creatures to the office that any sane person would leave at home. From motorcycles, chainsaws and bowling balls to his hyperactive cat and aggressive seagull. Gaston was always a danger for his co-workers, particularly his boss. Yet the biggest victim of Gaston's antics was Mr. De Mesmaeker, whom Fantasio and Prunelle kept trying to sign a business transaction. Time and time again Gaston managed to unwillingly offend him or destroy the contracts he brought along. And yet, whatever happened, Gaston always felt the others were overreacting, which he expressed by muttering: "M'enfin?!" ("What the...?" or "Oh, c'mon now!").
'Gaston's inability to deal with authority also brought him into conflict with police officer Longtarin who'd always try to fine Gaston for parking his car in the wrong spot or neglecting to put another nickle in the parking meter. The only people who actually liked Gaston were his friends Bertrand Labevué, Manu, Jules-de-chez-Smith-en-face (Jules-from-Smith's-across-the-street) and his co-worker Mademoiselle Jeanne who is hopelessly in love with him. It is a miracle that Gaston got fired only once during all these years, and this was after he brought a cow to the office. But tons of letters from pleading readers saved him.
...
'Gaston was also one of the first popular comic characters to star in advertising gags. Starting with a series of gags for the table beer Orange Pied-Boeuf in the 1950s, Gaston later appeared in advertising gags for Kodak in the 1970s, and in a series of gags for Philips batteries in the 1980s. Gaston's nephew also appeared in the Kodak pages....
....
'In 1981 'Gaston' was loosely adapted into a live-action film, 'Fais Gaffa à la Gaffe' (1981) by Paul Boujenah. Another attempt was made three decades later, 'Gaston Lagaffe' (2018) by Pierre-François Martin-Laval. Both were flops. In 1983 Henri Seroka brought out two singles, 'Petite souris qui m'sourit'/'Ça casse tout le rock à Gaston' (1981), based on the series. In 2009 the studio Normaal adapted the comic strip into animated TV shorts, which animated the original drawings by adding sound effects and movement.
'The 1950s and 1960s were the most productive period of Franquin's career. He not only drew Spirou's title comic, produced 'Gaston' and 'Modeste et Pompon', but also illustrated the covers for the books with collected editions of Spirou magazine, and designed beautiful headers for Spirou's frontpage, that served as introductions for new serials.....
.....
'Franquin frequently suffered from depressions, which at one point led to a long interruption of the Spirou story 'QRN sur Bretzelburg' in 1961. While his Spirou stories are nearly all classics, Franquin never felt at ease with the characters, as he didn't create them himself. The artist was his own worst critic, and he never really felt satisfied with his work. He mostly enjoyed creating the exploits of 'Gaston Lagaffe', and eventually felt more and more alienated from the 'Spirou' series. That's why he called it quits in 1968 and handed over the 'Spirou' series to the young Breton artist Jean-Claude Fournier in order to devote all of his time to 'Gaston'. He decided to keep the Marsupilami for himself though, for future use. To smoothe the transition to his successor, he did give a helping hand by drawing his long-tailed animal in Fournier's debut story.
....
'The darker side of Franquin's personality would come to notice in the pages of Le Trombone Illustré, a satirical supplement to Spirou that Franquin launched with Yvan Delporte in 1977. The supplement first introduced the cynical comic shadow plays, known as 'Idées Noires' ('Dark Thoughts'). But Franquin also created beautiful headers for this tabloid sized paper, starring a host of characters, including the Marsupilami and a rather strange bishop. Upon the cancellation of Le Trombone, the 'Idées Noires' started appearing in Fluide Glacial, the magazine of Franquin's friend Gotlib. Unlike Franquin's generally positive and poetic other work, these pages showed the author's pessimistic and more controversial view on human nature.
'The series came about as an outlet for his own depressions and features very black comedy. Some gags are fantasy-oriented, with jokes about monsters or people in science fiction settings. Others are more disturbing because they take their inspiration from real-life fears, like horrific accidents, executions, suicides, being eaten by animals, epidemics, world war, the atomic bomb and mankind eventually destroying itself. Particularly notable are the gags where Franquin expresses his left-wing opinions about game hunters, animal abuse, pollution, fur, smokers, the death penalty, religion, the army and nuclear energy. The nihilistic tone is complimented by the black-and-white ink drawings which all feature silhouetted characters cast in shadowy backgrounds. Despite its popularity with readers, Franquin eventually quit the series because it became all too depressing and formulaic.
'....Franquin's activities declined during the 1980s, and 'Gaston' made less frequent appearances in Spirou's pages throughout the decade. The artists's social consciousness also became clear in his later 'Gaston' gags. He used his character on specially designed posters and postcards for Unicef and Amnesty International, and humanitarian and ecological subjects were also explored in the regular gags. In 1980 Franquin was one of many Belgian comics artists to make a graphic contribution to the book 'Il était une fois... les Belges'/'Er waren eens Belgen' (1980), a collection of columns and one-page comics, published at the occasion of the 150th anniversary of Belgium. ...
'André Franquin, considered as one of the founding fathers of the Franco-Belgian comics tradition, passed away in Saint-Laurent du Var in January 1997. His impressive oeuvre continues to be reprinted in varying formats to this day. From the collection of his complete works at Éditions Rombaldi in the 1980s to the large format luxury publications with reproductions of Franquin's original artwork at Marsu Productions in the 2000s, the demand for Franquin's work seems to be insatiable.....
'Several studies of Franquin's work have appeared. One of the first and probably best-known is 'Et Franquin créa la gaffe' (1986), a collection of interviews with Franquin about his work by Numa Sadoul. A quite complete overview of his life and work was compiled and written by José-Louis Bocquet and Eric Verhoest under the title 'Franquin - Chronologie d'une Oeuvre', at Marsu Productions in 2007. ....'
The recurrent cartoon character created by Franquin, Gaston Lagaffe, has pets, including a cat.
This reproduction is a thumbnail of a c. 1980 ink on paper rendering of Lagaffe's feline.
and
....
'The darker side of Franquin's personality would come to notice in the pages of Le Trombone Illustré, a satirical supplement to Spirou that Franquin launched with Yvan Delporte in 1977. The supplement first introduced the cynical comic shadow plays, known as 'Idées Noires' ('Dark Thoughts'). But Franquin also created beautiful headers for this tabloid sized paper, starring a host of characters, including the Marsupilami and a rather strange bishop. Upon the cancellation of Le Trombone, the 'Idées Noires' started appearing in Fluide Glacial, the magazine of Franquin's friend Gotlib. Unlike Franquin's generally positive and poetic other work, these pages showed the author's pessimistic and more controversial view on human nature.
'The series came about as an outlet for his own depressions and features very black comedy. Some gags are fantasy-oriented, with jokes about monsters or people in science fiction settings. Others are more disturbing because they take their inspiration from real-life fears, like horrific accidents, executions, suicides, being eaten by animals, epidemics, world war, the atomic bomb and mankind eventually destroying itself. Particularly notable are the gags where Franquin expresses his left-wing opinions about game hunters, animal abuse, pollution, fur, smokers, the death penalty, religion, the army and nuclear energy. The nihilistic tone is complimented by the black-and-white ink drawings which all feature silhouetted characters cast in shadowy backgrounds. Despite its popularity with readers, Franquin eventually quit the series because it became all too depressing and formulaic.
'....Franquin's activities declined during the 1980s, and 'Gaston' made less frequent appearances in Spirou's pages throughout the decade. The artists's social consciousness also became clear in his later 'Gaston' gags. He used his character on specially designed posters and postcards for Unicef and Amnesty International, and humanitarian and ecological subjects were also explored in the regular gags. In 1980 Franquin was one of many Belgian comics artists to make a graphic contribution to the book 'Il était une fois... les Belges'/'Er waren eens Belgen' (1980), a collection of columns and one-page comics, published at the occasion of the 150th anniversary of Belgium. ...
'André Franquin, considered as one of the founding fathers of the Franco-Belgian comics tradition, passed away in Saint-Laurent du Var in January 1997. His impressive oeuvre continues to be reprinted in varying formats to this day. From the collection of his complete works at Éditions Rombaldi in the 1980s to the large format luxury publications with reproductions of Franquin's original artwork at Marsu Productions in the 2000s, the demand for Franquin's work seems to be insatiable.....
'Several studies of Franquin's work have appeared. One of the first and probably best-known is 'Et Franquin créa la gaffe' (1986), a collection of interviews with Franquin about his work by Numa Sadoul. A quite complete overview of his life and work was compiled and written by José-Louis Bocquet and Eric Verhoest under the title 'Franquin - Chronologie d'une Oeuvre', at Marsu Productions in 2007. ....'
The recurrent cartoon character created by Franquin, Gaston Lagaffe, has pets, including a cat.
This reproduction is a thumbnail of a c. 1980 ink on paper rendering of Lagaffe's feline.
and
Although a regular character, this cat of Franquin's and Le Gaffe's has no name.
No comments:
Post a Comment