Moebius or Möbius may refer to:

People[link]

• August Ferdinand Möbius (1790–1868), German mathematician and astronomer
• Karl Möbius (1825–1908), German zoologist and ecologist
• Paul Julius Möbius (1853–1907), German neurologist
• Dieter Moebius (born 1944), German/Swiss musician
• Jean Giraud (1938–2012), French comics artist who used the pseudonym Mœbius
• Mobius Artists Group, international group of experimental artists
• Mark Mobius (born 1936), emerging markets investments pioneer

Chemistry[link]

• Möbius-Hückel concept

Mathematics[link]

• Möbius strip, an object with one surface and one edge
• Möbius function, in number theory
• Möbius transform
• Möbius inversion formula, in number theory
• Möbius transformation, in geometry
• Möbius configuration, in geometry
• Möbius–Kantor configuration, in geometry
• Möbius–Kantor graph, in graph theory

Gaming[link]

• Mobius (C&C), or Dr. Ignato Mobius, a character in the Command & Conquer game universe
• Moebius: The Orb of Celestial Harmony, a 1985 computer game
• Moebius the Timestreamer, a character in the Legacy of Kain video game series
• Mobius, a planet in certain localisations and adaptations of the Sonic the Hedgehog series
  • Moebius, the alternate reality of Mobius, home of Evil Sonic (or Scourge)
• Mobius 1, the call sign of the main character of Ace Combat 4
• Möebius, the scientific foundation from Starcraft II
• Moebius, a classic "point and click" adventure game in development by Jane Jensen

Television and film[link]

• "Moebius" (Stargate SG-1), a 2005 two-part episode of the science fiction TV series Stargate SG-1
• TS-MA2 Moebius, a fictional mobile armour from the Gundam anime metaseries
• Silent Möbius, a series of manga, anime, and film
• Ultraman Mebius, a Japanese television series, and the titular superhero
• Moebius (film), an Argentinian film about a subway wagon endless loop explained as a Moebius strip

Other uses[link]

• MOBIUS, a library consortium in Missouri, United States
• Mobius project, a data grid middleware project
• Möbius aromaticity, a special type of aromaticity found in some organic molecules
• Möbius benzene, also known as trans-benzene, an isomer of benzene demonstrating Möbius aromaticity
• Möbius (crater), a lunar crater
• Möbius syndrome, or Moebius, a rare congenital disorder resulting in facial paralysis
• Möbius resistor, in electronics
• "The Moebius", a song by Orbital on Orbital (1991 album)
• Mobius Kids, Spokane, Washington, a children's museum
• Mobius Science Center, Spokane, Washington, United States, a planned science museum
• Möbius, one of the three physicists in the play The Physicists by Friedrich Dürrenmatt

See also[link]

• Morbius (disambiguation)

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

Jean Giraud
Jean Giraud at the International Festival of Comics in Łódź, 4 October 2008.
Born	(1938-05-08)8 May 1938 Nogent-sur-Marne, Val-de-Marne, France
Died	10 March 2012(2012-03-10) (aged 73) Paris, France
Nationality	French
Area(s)	Writer, Artist
Pseudonym(s)	Mœbius, Gir
Notable works	Blueberry Arzach The Incal
Notable collaborations	Alejandro Jodorowsky, Jean-Michel Charlier
Awards	Full list
Influences Jean-Paul Appel-Guéry,[1] Jijé
Influenced Taiyō Matsumoto, William Gibson
Signature
150px
Official website

Jean Henri Gaston Giraud (8 May 1938 – 10 March 2012) was a French comics artist, working in the French tradition of bandes dessinées. Giraud earned worldwide fame, predominantly under the pseudonym Mœbius, and to a lesser extent Gir (used for the Blueberry series), the latter appearing mostly in the form of a boxed signature at the bottom of the artist's paintings. Esteemed by Federico Fellini, Stan Lee and Hayao Miyazaki among others, he received international acclaim.^[2] He has been described as the most influential bandes dessinées artist after Hergé.^[3]

Among his most famous works are the Western comic series Blueberry he co-created with writer Jean-Michel Charlier, one of the first Western anti-heroes to appear in comics. Under the pseudonym Moebius he created a wide range of science fiction and fantasy comics in a highly imaginative and surreal almost abstract style, the most famous of which are Arzach, the Airtight Garage of Jerry Cornelius, and The Incal. Blueberry was adapted for the screen in 2004 by French director Jan Kounen. In 1997, Moebius and cocreator Alejandro Jodorowsky sued Luc Besson for using The Incal as inspiration for his movie The Fifth Element, a lawsuit which they lost.^[4]

Moebius contributed storyboards and concept designs to numerous science fiction and fantasy films, including Alien, Willow, Tron (1982), and The Fifth Element.

Early life[link]

Jean Giraud was born in Nogent-sur-Marne, Val-de-Marne, in the suburbs of Paris, on May 8, 1938.^[5][6] When he was three years old, his parents divorced and he was raised mainly by his grandparents. The rupture between mother and father, city and country, created a lasting trauma that he explained lay at the heart of his choice of separate pen names.^[7] In 1955 at age 16, he began his only technical training at the Arts Appliqués art school, where he started producing Western comics. He became close friends with another comic artist Jean-Claude Mézières. In 1956 he left art school to visit his mother in Mexico and he stayed there eight months, after which he returned to work full time as an artist.^[8] In 1959-1960 he served his military service in Algeria, where he collaborated on the army magazine 5/5 Forces Françaises.^[9]

Career[link]

Western comics[link]

At 18, Giraud was drawing his own comic strip, "Frank et Jeremie" for the magazine Far West. From 1956 to 1958 he published Western comics in the magazine "Coeurs Valiants", among them a strip called "King of the Buffalo", and another called "a Giant with the Hurons". Already in this period his style was heavily influenced by his later mentor, Joseph "Jijé" Gillain.^[8] In 1961, returning from military service in Algiers, Giraud became an apprentice of Jijé, who was one of the leading comic artists in Europe of the time. Jijé used Giraud as his assistant on an album of his Western series Jerry Spring, "The Road to Coronado" which Giraud inked.^[9]

In 1962 Giraud and writer Jean-Michel Charlier started the comic strip Fort Navajo for Pilote no. 210. At this time affinity between the styles of Giraud and Jijé was so close that Jijé penciled pages 17-38 of the fourth Blueberry album, "The Lost Story", when Giraud was traveling in the United States.^[10]

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^[11][12] and quickly became its most popular figure. His adventures as told in the spin-off Western serial Blueberry, are possibly Giraud's best known work in his native France before his 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, but gradually Giraud developed a darker and grittier style inspired by the Spaghetti Westerns of Sergio Leone and the dark realism of Sam Peckinpah.^[13] With the fifth album, "The Trail of the Navajos", Giraud established his own style, and after censorship laws were loosened in 1968 the strip became more explicitly adult, and also adopted a wider range of thematics.^[10][3] "Angel Face", the first Blueberry album penciled by Giraud after he had begun publishing science fiction as Moebius, was much more experimental than his previous Western work.^[10]

Giraud left the series in 1973 leaving the artwork to Colin Wilson, Michel Rouge and later Michel Blanc-Dumont for a few books. He returned to it in the following decade, producing many more very successful Blueberry stories, further increasing its already outstanding quality.

In 1979 Charlier and Giraud had a disagreement with their publishing house Dargaud over the publishing of Blueberry. Instead they began the western comic Jim Cutlass. After the first album "Mississippi River", first serialized in Metal Hurlant, Giraud took on scripting the series, and left the artwork to Christian Rossi.^[14]

When Charlier, Giraud's collaborator on Blueberry died in 1989, Giraud assumed responsibility for the scripting of the series. Blueberry has been translated into 15 languages, the first English translations by Marc Lofficier being published in 1970. The original Blueberry series has spun off a prequel series called "Young Blueberry", and a sequel called "Marshall Blueberry".^[11]

Science fiction and fantasy comics[link]

The Moebius pseudonym, which Giraud came to use for his science fiction and fantasy work, was born in 1963.^[9] In a satire magazine called Hara-Kiri, Moebius did 21 strips in 1963–64 and then disappeared for almost a decade.

In 1975 he revived the Moebius pseudonym, and with Jean-Pierre Dionnet, Philippe Druillet, and Bernard Farkas, he became one of the founding members of the comics art group "Les Humanoides Associes".^[15] Together they started the magazine Métal Hurlant, the magazine known in the English speaking world as Heavy Metal . Moebius' famous serial The Airtight Garage and his groundbreaking Arzach both began in Métal Hurlant.^[16] In 1976 Metal Hurlant published The Long Tomorrow written by Dan O'Bannon.

Arzach is a wordless comic, created in a conscious attempt to breathe new life into the comic genre which at the time was dominated by American superhero comics. 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 has no captions, no speech balloons and no 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]

His series The Airtight Garage 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). The series tells of Major Grubert, who is constructing his own universe on an Asteroid named fleur, here he encounters a wealth of fantastic characters including Michael Moorcock's creation Jerry Cornelius.^[17]

In 1981 he started his famous L'Incal series in collaboration with Alejandro Jodorowsky.

In his later life, Moebius decided to revive the Arzak character in an elaborate new adventure series, the first volume of a planned trilogy, Arzak l'arpenteur, appeared in 2010. He also began new work in the Airtight Garage series with a volume entitled Le chasseur déprime.

Marvel Comics[link]

A two-issue Silver Surfer miniseries (later collected as Silver Surfer: Parable), scripted by Lee and drawn by Moebius, was published through Marvel's Epic Comics imprint in 1988 and 1989. Because of inconsistencies with other stories, it has been argued that these stories actually feature an alternate Silver Surfer from a parallel Earth.^[18] This miniseries won the Eisner Award for best finite/limited series in 1989.

Other work[link]

From 2000 to 2010, Giraud published Inside Moebius (French text despite English title), an illustrated autobiographical fantasy in six hardcover volumes totaling 700 pages.^[7]. 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 last volume of the XIII series titled La Version Irlandaise (The Irish Version) from a script by Jean Van Hamme, 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).^[19]

Illustrator and author[link]

Under the names Giraud and Gir, he also wrote numerous comics for other comic artists like Auclair and Tardi. He also made illustrations for books and magazines, illustrating for example one edition of the novel "The Alchemist" by Paulo Coelho.

Films[link]

Moebius contributed storyboards and concept designs to numerous science fiction films, including Alien by Ridley Scott, Tron by Disney, The Fifth Element by Luc Besson, Star Wars V, and for Jodorowsky's planned adaptation of Frank Herbert's Dune, which was however abandoned in pre-production.^[20]

In 1982 he collaborated 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.^[21]

With Yutaka Fujioka, he wrote the story — for the 1982 Japan­ese ani­mated fea­ture film Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland; as well, he was a con­cep­tual designer for the movie.^[21]

Giraud made orig­i­nal char­ac­ter designs and did visual devel­op­ment for Warner Bros.’ partly ani­mated 1996 movie Space Jam. And though uncred­ited, he pro­vided char­ac­ters and sit­u­a­tions for the "Taarna" seg­ment of Ivan Reitman’s 1981 film Heavy Metal.^[21]

In 1991 his graphic novel Cauchemar Blanc was cinematized by Matthieu Kassovitz. The Blueberry series was adapted for the screen in 2004, by Jan Kounen as Blueberry: L'expérience secrète.

Exhibitions[link]

From December 2004 to March 2005, his work was exhibited with that of Hayao Miyazaki at La Monnaie in Paris.^[22]

Stamps[link]

Giraud's prestige in France – where comics are held in high artistic regard – is enormous; In 1988 Moebius 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.^[23]

Style[link]

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.^[24] 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.^[25] 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.^[26]

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 drew very quickly.^[27]

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]

Throughout his career he experimented with drugs and various New Age type philosophies, such as Guy-Claude Burger's instinctotherapy, which influenced his creation of the comic book series Le Monde d'Edena.^[2][7]

Death[link]

Giraud died in Paris, on 10 March 2012, aged 73, after a long battle with cancer.^{[28][29][30][31]} The immediate cause of death was pulmonary embolism caused by a lymphoma. Moebius was buried on the 15th of March, on the Montparnasse Cemetery^[32] Fellow comic artist François Boucq stated that Moebius 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".^[33]

Influence and legacy[link]

Many artists from around the world have cited Giraud as an influence on their work. Giraud was longtime friends with manga author and anime filmmaker Hayao Miyazaki. Giraud even named his daughter Nausicaä after the character in Miyazaki's Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind.^[34][35] Asked by Giraud in an interview how he first discovered his work, Miyazaki replied:

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 Moebius's influence.^[36][37]

Pioneering cyberpunk author William Gibson said of Giraud's work The Long Tomorrow:

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.^[38]

The Long Tomorrow also came to the attention of Ridley Scott and was a key visual reference for Blade Runner.^[38]

"I consider him more important than Doré," said Italian filmmaker Federico Fellini:

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. ^[39]

Following his death, Brazilian author Paulo Coelho, paid tribute on Twitter stating:

"The great Moebius died today, but the great Moebius is still alive. Your body died today, your work is more alive than ever."^[33]

Benoit Mouchart, artistic director at France's Angouleme International Comics Festival, made an assesment of his importance to the field of comics:

"France has lost one of its best known artists in the world. In Japan, Italy, in the United States he is an incredible star who influenced world comics. Moebius will remain part of the history of drawing, in the same right as Dürer or Ingres. He was an incredible producer, he said he wanted to show what eyes do not always see".^[33]

French Culture Minister Frederic Mitterrand said that by the simultaneous death of Giraud and Moebius, France had lost "two great artists"^[33]

Bibliography[link]

Those works for which English translations have been published are noted as such. Their respective pages describe this further.

As Jean Giraud[link]

• Blueberry (29 volumes, English translation, 1965 - ), artist (all vol), writer vol 25-29
• Jim Cutlass (7 volumes, 1979–1999), artist vol. 1, writer vol 2-7 (artist: Christian Rossi)
• XIII (volume 18, La Version irlandaise in 2007), artist
• Marshall Blueberry (3 volumes, 2000), writer
• Le Cristal Majeur (3 volumes, 1986–1990), writer (artist: Marc Bati), Paris: Dargaud

As Moebius[link]

• Le Bandard fou (English translation, 1975), writer and artist
• Arzach (English translation, 1976), writer and artist
• The Long Tomorrow (Originally in English, 1976), artist
• L'Homme est-il bon? (English translation, 1977), writer and artist
• Le Garage Hermétique (The Airtight Garage, English translation, 1976–1980), writer and artist
• Les Yeux du Chat (1978), artist
• Tueur de monde (1979), writer and artist
• l'Incal (The Incal, 6 volumes, English translation, 1981–1988), artist
• Les Maîtres du temps (1982), artist
• Venise céleste (1984), writer and artist
• Le Monde d'Edena (1985–2001), writer and artist
• Altor (7 volumes, 1986 - ), writer
• Silver Surfer: Parable (Originally in English, 1988–1989), artist
• Escale sur Pharagonescia (1989), writer and artist
• Les Vacances du Major (1992), writer and artist
• Le Coeur couronné (The Crowned Heart, English translation, 1992), artist
• Les Histoires de Monsieur Mouche (1994), artist
• Griffes d'Ange (1994), artist
• Little Nemo (1994), writer
• Ballades (1 volume, 1995), artist
• Après l'Incal (2000 - ), artist
• Icare (2005), writer
• Halo Graphic Novel (Originally in English, 2006), artist
• Inside Moebius (2000–2010), writer and artist
• Arzak L'Arpenteur (2010), writer and artist

Collected editions[link]

The English-language versions of many of Moebius's comics have been collected into various editions, beginning with a series of trade paperbacks from Marvel Comics' Epic imprint in the late 1980s and early 1990s:

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

• Moebius 0 - The Horny Goof & Other Underground Stories (72 pages, Dark Horse, 1990, ISBN 1-878574-16-7)
• Moebius ½ - The Early Moebius & Other Humorous Stories (Graphitti Designs, 1992, ISBN 0-936211-28-8)
• Moebius 1 - Upon A Star (72 pages, Marvel/Epic, 1987, ISBN 0-87135-278-8)
• Moebius 2 - Arzach & Other Fantasy Stories (72 pages, Titan, ISBN 1-85286-045-6, Marvel/Epic, 1987)
• Moebius 3 - The Airtight Garage (120 pages, Titan, ISBN 1-85286-046-4, Marvel/Epic, 1987)
• Moebius 4 - The Long Tomorrow & Other Science Fiction Stories (70 pages, Marvel/Epic, 1987, ISBN 0-87135-281-8)
• Moebius 5 - The Gardens of Aedena (72 pages, Titan, ISBN 1-85286-047-2, Marvel/Epic, 1988, ISBN 0-87135-282-6)
• Moebius 6 - Pharagonesia & Other Strange Stories (72 pages, Titan, ISBN 1-85286-048-0, Marvel/Epic, 1988)
• Moebius 7 - The Goddess (88 pages, Marvel/Epic, 1990, ISBN 0-87135-714-3)
• Moebius 8 - Mississippi River (64 pages, Marvel/Epic, 1991, ISBN 0-87135-715-1)
• Moebius 9 - Stel (Marvel/Epic, 1994)

Most of these volumes were later reissued by Graphitti Designs in assorted combinations, as a series of signed and numbered hardcover limited editions.

In 2010 and 2011, the publisher Humanoids (in the U.S.) began releasing new editions of Moebius works, starting with three of Moebius's past collaborations with Alexandro Jodorowsky: The Incal (original series complete in one volume), Madwoman of the Sacred Heart (all three parts complete in one volume), and The Eyes of the Cat.

Filmography[link]

• Alien (1979)
• The Time Masters (1982)
• Tron (1982)
• Masters of the Universe (1987)
• Willow (1988)
• The Abyss (1989)
• Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland
• The Fifth Element (1997) - The production design for the film was developed by Giraud and Jean-Claude Mézières and is detailed in a DVD/Blu-ray special feature.
• Fellini: I'm a Born Liar (2002) - Giraud conceived the poster for the documentary's 2003 North American release and appears in the DVD bonus extras of the French version.
• Blueberry (2004) - On the DVD extras Giraud talks about the comic, the film etc., dressed in period costume, apparently having done a cameo role in the film.
• Thru the Moebius Strip (2005)
• Giraud worked on Alejandro Jodorowsky's film adaptation of Dune which was never completed.
• Giraud's artwork for the Dan O'Bannon short story comic "The Long Tomorrow" was a key visual reference for Blade Runner.
• Giraud represented the jury of the Paris Storyboard Contest 2005 (Concours SOPADIN - Société Parisienne des Images Nouvelles) and awarded the two young artists and filmmakers "K-Michel Parandi" (Kay Parandi) & "Jean François Guillon" for their work on the futuristic and experimental film "Minuit 14". Jean Giraud was assisted on this by the notorious French director "Gerard Krawczyk" (Taxi, Fanfan la tulipe).
• George Lucas used one of Giraud's designs for the Imperial Probe Droid in Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back. Lucas's later Star Wars films also share many visual characteristics with Giraud's work, particularly the depiction of the city-planet Coruscant.
• Giraud also shared "Story by" credit on the animated film Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland.
• Strange frame (2009)

Video games[link]

• Fade to Black cover art (1995)
• Panzer Dragoon (1995)
• Pilgrim: Faith as a Weapon (1998)
• An arcade and bar based on Giraud's work, called The Airtight Garage, was one of the original main attractions at the Metreon in San Francisco when the complex opened in 1999. It included three original games: Quaternia, a first-person shooter networked between terminals and based on the concept of "junctors" from Major Fatal and The Airtight Garage; a virtual reality bumper cars game about mining asteroids; and Hyperbowl, an obstacle course bowling game incorporating very little overtly Moebius imagery. The arcade was closed and reopened as "Portal One", retaining much of the Moebius-based decor and Hyperbowl but eliminating the other originals in favor of more common arcade games.

Documentaries[link]

• The Masters of Comic Book Art - Documentary by Ken Viola (USA, 1987, 60 min.)
• La Constellation Jodorowsky - Documentary by Louis Mouchet. Giraud and Alejandro Jodorowsky on The Incal and their abandoned film adaptation of Frank Herbert's Dune. During the psycho-genealogical session that concludes the film, Giraud impersonates Mouchet's father (Switzerland, 1994, 88 min. and 52 min.)
• Mister Gir & Mike S. Blueberry - Documentary by Damian Pettigrew. Giraud executes numerous sketches and watercolors for the Blueberry album, "Géronimo l'Apache", travels to Saint Malo for the celebrated comic-book festival, visits his Paris editor Dargaud, and in the film's last sequence, does a spontaneous life-size portrait in real time of Geronimo on a large sheet of glass (France, 2000: Musée de la Bande dessinée d'Angoulême, 55 min.)
• Moebius Redux: A Life in Pictures - Biographical documentary by Hasko Baumann (Germany, England, Finland, 2007: Arte, BBC, ZDF, YLE, 68 min.)
• In Search of Moebius - Shorter BBC version of Hasko Baumann documentary (2007, 53 min.)
• Jean Van Hamme, William Vance et Jean Giraud à l'Abbaye de l'Épau - Institutional documentary (France, 2007: FGBL Audiovisuel, 70 min.)
• Métamoebius - Autobiographical portrait co-written by Jean Giraud and directed by Damian Pettigrew for the 2010 retrospective held at the Fondation Cartier for Contemporary Art in Paris (France, 2010: Fondation Cartier, CinéCinéma, 72 min. and 52 min.)

Awards[link]

• 1973: Shazam Award, Best Foreign Comic Series, for Lieutenant Blueberry
• 1975: Yellow Kid Award, Lucca, Italy, Best Foreign Artist^[40]
• 1977: Angoulême International Comics Festival Best French Artist
• 1979: Adamson Award, for Lieutenant Blueberry etc.
• 1980: Yellow Kid Award, Lucca, Italy, Best Foreign Author^[41]
• 1980: Grand Prix de la Science Fiction Française, Special Prize, for Major Fatal^[42]
• 1981: Angoulême International Comics Festival Grand Prix de la ville d'Angoulême
• 1985: Angoulême International Comics Festival Grand Prix for the graphic arts
• 1986: Inkpot Award
• 1988: Harvey Award, Best American Edition of Foreign Material, for Moebius album series
• 1989: Eisner Award, Best Finite Series, for Silver Surfer
• 1989: Harvey Award, Best American Edition of Foreign Material, for Incal
• 1991: Eisner Award, Best Single Issue, for Concrete
• 1991: Harvey Award, Best American Edition of Foreign Material, for Lieutenant Blueberry
• 1997: Designated finalist for induction into the Harvey Award Jack Kirby Hall of Fame in 1989, inducted in 1997
• 1997: World Fantasy Award: Artist category
• 1998: Included in the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame
• 2000: Max & Moritz Prizes, Special Prize for outstanding life's work
• 2001: Haxtur Award Best Long Comic Strip, for The Crowned Heart

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Jean Giraud (Gir, Moebius) publications in Spirou, Pilote, Métal Hurlant, Fluide Glacial, (A SUIVRE) and BoDoï BDoubliées (French)
• Jean Giraud albums Bedetheque (French)
• Moebius albums Bedetheque (French)
• Jean Giraud on Bdparadisio.com (French)
• Jean Giraud Moebius on Artfacts.net, about the expositions of original drawings of Moebius. (English)
• Moebius publications in English www.europeancomics.net (English)
• Illustration Art Gallery
• Jean Giraud at the Comic Book DB

Further reading[link]

• Erik Svane, Martin Surmann, Alain Ledoux, Martin Jurgeit, Gerhard Förster, Horst Berner (2003, Zack-Dossier 1; Berlin: Mosaik): "Blueberry und der europäische Western-Comic" (German) ISBN 3-932667-59-X

External links[link]

Biography portal

• Official website (French)
• Twists of Fate on France magazine (English)
• Jean Giraud profile on Artfacts (English)
• Giraud on bpip.com (English)
• Jean Giraud on Lambiek Comiclopedia (English)
• Moebius at the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Giraud at the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Moebius on contours-art.de (German)
• Interview Jean Giraud - The Eternal Traveler
• Jean Moebius Giraud biography at the Science Fiction Hall of Fame
• French comic book illustrator Moebius dies in Paris by Radio France Internationale English service
• Moebius Interview - ArtFutura (English)

Hugo Pratt
1989
Born	(1927-06-15)June 15, 1927 Rimini, Italy
Died	August 20, 1995(1995-08-20) (aged 68) Grandvaux, Switzerland
Nationality	Italian
Area(s)	Writer, Artist
Notable works	Corto Maltese Gli scorpioni del deserto Jesuit Joe Saint-Exupéry
Awards	full list

Hugo Eugenio Pratt (June 15, 1927 – August 20, 1995) was an Italian comic book creator who was known for combining strong storytelling with extensive historical research on works such as Corto Maltese. He was inducted into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame in 2005.

Biography[link]

Early years[link]

Born in Rimini in Romagna to Rolando Pratt and Evelina Genero, Hugo Pratt spent most of his childhood in Venice in a very cosmopolitan family environment. His paternal grandfather Joseph was of English origin, while his maternal grandfather was a Marrano Jew and his maternal grandmother was of Turkish origin. He was also related to the actor Boris Karloff, whose birth name was William Henry Pratt. In 1937, Hugo Pratt moved with his mother to Abyssinia (Ethiopia), joining his father who was working there following the conquest of that country by Benito Mussolini's Italy. Pratt's father, a professional Italian soldier, was captured in 1941 by British troops and in late 1942, died from disease as a prisoner of war. The same year, Hugo Pratt and his mother were interned in a prison camp at Dirédaoua where he would buy comics from guards and later was sent back to Italy by the Red Cross. In 1944, he was at risk of being executed as SS troops had mistaken him for a South African spy.

After the war, Pratt moved to Venice where he organized entertainment for the Allied troops. Later Pratt joined the 'Venice Group' with other Italian cartoonists, including Alberto Ongaro and Mario Faustinelli. Their magazine Asso di Picche, launched in 1945 as Albo Uragano, concentrated on adventure comics. The magazine scored some success and published works by young talents like Dino Battaglia, Rinaldo D'Ami and Giorgio Bellavitis. His character Asso di Picche ("Ace of Spades") was a success, mainly in Argentina, where Pratt was invited in 1949.

Argentine years[link]

1989

In the late 1940s, he moved to Buenos Aires where he worked for Argentine publisher Editorial Abril and met Argentine comics artists like José Luis Salinas, Alberto Breccia and Solano López. The passage to Editorial Frontera saw the publication of some of his most important early series. These included Junglemen (written by Ongaro), Sgt. Kirk, Ernie Pike and Ticonderoga. They were all written by Héctor Germán Oesterheld, one of the major writers of Argentine and perhaps world comics. Pratt taught drawing in the Escuela Panamericana de Arte directed by Enrique Lipszyc. He often travelled to South American destinations like the Amazon and Mato Grosso. During that period he produced his first comic book as a complete author, both writing and illustrating Anna della jungla ("Ann of the Jungle"), which was followed by the similar Capitan Cormorant and Wheeling. The latter was completed after his return to Italy.

Return to Italy and the creation of Corto Maltese[link]

From the summer of 1959 to the summer of 1960, Pratt lived in London where he drew a series of war comics for Fleetway Publications, with British scriptwriters. He then returned to Argentina, despite the harsh economic times there. From there, he moved again to Italy in 1962 where he started a collaboration with the children's comic book magazine Il Corriere dei Piccoli, for which he adapted several classics of adventure literature, including Treasure Island and Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson.

In 1967, Pratt met Florenzo Ivaldi, and with him created a comics magazine named after his character, Sgt. Kirk, the hero first written by Héctor Oesterheld. In the first issue, Pratt's most famous story was published: Una ballata del mare salato (A Ballad of the Salt Sea), which introduced his best known character, Corto Maltese.

Corto's series continued three years later in the French magazine Pif. Due to his rather mixed family ancestry, Pratt had learned snippets of things like kabbalism and lots of history. Many of his stories are placed in real historical eras and deal with real events: the 1755 war between French and British colonists in Ticonderoga, colonial wars in Africa and both World Wars, for example. Pratt did exhaustive research for factual and visual details, and some characters are real historical figures or loosely based on them, like Corto's main opponent, Rasputin. Many of the minor characters cross over into other stories in a way that places all of Pratt’s stories into the same continuum.

Pratt's main series in the second part of his career include Gli scorpioni del deserto (five stories) and Jesuit Joe. He also wrote stories for his friend and pupil Milo Manara for Tutto ricominciò con un'estate indiana and El Gaucho.

Later years[link]

From 1970 to 1984, Pratt lived mainly in France where Corto Maltese, a psychologically very complex character resulting from the travel experiences and the endless inventive capacity of his author, became the main character of a comics series. Initially published from 1970 to 1973 by the magazine Pif gadget, it brought him much popular and critical success. Later published in album format, this series was eventually translated into fifteen languages.

From 1984 to 1995 Pratt lived in Switzerland where the international success that Corto Maltese sparked continued to grow. In France, most of his pre-Corto Maltese works were published in several album editions by publishers such as Casterman, Dargaud, and Humanoides Associés. A wanderer by nature, Hugo Pratt continued to travel from Canada to Patagonia, from Africa to the Pacific area. He died of cancer on 20 August 1995.

Pratt has cited authors like Robert Louis Stevenson, James Oliver Curwood, Zane Gray, Kenneth Roberts, Joseph Conrad, Fenimore Cooper, Herman Melville and Jack London as influences, along with cartoonists Lyman Young, Will Eisner, and especially Milton Caniff.

On Friday, July 15, 2005, at San Diego Comic-Con's 17th Annual Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards, he was one of four professionals that year inducted into the Comic Book Hall of Fame.

One of the series created by Pratt, entitled "The Scorpions of the Desert" in English, has been continued after Pratt's death. In 2005 a sixth volume in this series was released, drawn by Pierre Wazeem and entitled "Le chemin de fièvre". A seventh album was scheduled by the French publishers Casterman for release in March 2008. Casterman have also on several occasions hinted at the possible future release of a further episode in the Corto Maltese saga.

Main works[link]

• Asso di Picche (L'As de pique, Ace of Spades, 1945–1949)
• El Sargento Kirk (Sgt. Kirk, 1953–1959), written by Héctor Oesterheld
• Ticonderoga (1957–1958), written by Héctor Oesterheld
• Ernie Pike (1957–1959), written by Héctor Oesterheld
• Ann y Dan (Anna nella giungla, "Ann of the Jungle", Ann de la jungle, 1959)
• Capitan Cormorant (1962)
• Wheeling (1962)
• Corto Maltese (1967–1992)
  • Una Ballata del Mare Salato, La Ballade de la mer salée (1967) - translated into English as Ballad of The Salt Sea (Harvill Press 1996)
  • Sous le signe du Capricorne (1970)
  • Corto toujours un peu plus loin - partly translated into English as The Banana Conga (1979-1971)
  • Les Celtiques - translated into English as The Celts, (Harvill Press 1996) and A Mid-Winter Morning's Dream (1971–1972)
  • Les Ethiopiques (1972–1973)
  • Corte sconta detta Arcana - Corto Maltese en Sibérie (1974–1975)
  • Favola di Venezia - Sirat Al-Bunduqiyyah - Fable de Venise (19)
  • La casa dorata di Samarcanda - La Maison dorée de Samarkand (1980)
  • La Jeunesse de Corto (1981)
  • Tango...y todo a media luz - Tango (1985)
  • Elvetiche - Les Helvétiques (1987)
  • Mu (1988)
• Gli scorpioni del deserto - Les Scorpions du Desert, The Scorpions of the Desert (1969–92)
  • Les Scorpions du désert (Episode 1, 1969–73)
  • Piccolo chalet... (1975)
  • Vanghe Dancale (1980)
  • Dry Martini Parlor (1982)
  • Brise de mer (1992)
• Sven - L'homme des Caraïbes (1976)
• La macumba du Gringo (1977)
• À l'Ouest de l'Éden (1978)
• Jesuit Joe (1980)
• Tutto ricominciò con un'estate indiana (Indian Summer, 1983, with Milo Manara)
• Cato Zulu (1984–88)
• El Gaucho (1991), with Milo Manara
• Saint-Exupéry - le dernier vol (1994)
• Morgan (1995)

Awards[link]

• 1969: Gran Guinigi per il disegnatore italiano (award for an Italian artist) at the Festival of Lucca, Italy, for Una ballata del mare salato^[1]
• 1974: Prix Saint-Michel, for the best realistic story
• 1976: Angoulême Festival, Best foreign realistic comic book, for La ballade de la mer salée^[2]
• 1981: Angoulême Festival, Elle award^[3]
• 1987: Angoulême Festival, Best foreign comic book, for Indian Summer^[4]
• 1988: Angoulême Festival, 15th anniversary special Grand Prix de la ville d'Angoulême^[5]
• 1996: Max & Moritz Prizes, Germany, Best German language comic import, for Saint-Exupéry - le dernier vol
• 2005: Inducted into the Will Eisner Award Hall of Fame

Sources[link]

Footnotes

• Hugo Pratt official website
• Hugo Pratt Archives
• Hugo Pratt biography on Lambiek
• Biography by Paul Gravett Retrieved 14-05-2009
• Hugo in Africa - a film by Stefano Knuchel
• La Casa di Corto Maltese - House Museum