To be honest, it’s hard for me to even begin to sum up who Jean Giraud was. He passed away, losing his battle with cancer, but like Ralph McQuarrie who passed away last week, his influence will continue to inspire for generations to come.
Before the age of eighteen, the French cartoonist was illustrating his own comic strip, Frank et Jeremie, and several years later, he started work on his western, Blueberry with Jean-Michel Charlier. During his long run on the serial, he experimented considerably, evolving his drawing style along the way.
He reinvented himself in the early seventies, as co-founder of the magazine Metal Hurlant (which became Heavy Metal in the US) and adopting the name Moebius.
His work in Metal Hurlant established Giraud as France’s most important cartoonist. Among his most memorable works are The Airtight Garage, Arzach and collaborations with filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky, which included The Incal.
Moebius also collaborated with some of the medium’s most interesting and iconic voices including Stan Lee, Hayao Miyazaki and Geof Darrow. Hollywood discovered Moebius as well contributing to such productions as Jodorowsky’s unproduced Dune, Alien, Tron, Masters of the Universe, The Fifth Element, and Willow. He was the recipient of virtually every major comic award including several awards from the Angoulême International Comics Festival, The Harveys, The Inkpot, The Eisners and The World Fantasy Award.
It’s said that a picture is worth a thousand words. After the jump check out another thirty thousand or so “words” that can only begin to sum up this amazing genius.
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