Moebius

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 tradition. Giraud earned worldwide fame, predominantly under the pseudonym Mœbius, and to a lesser extent Gir, which he used for the Blueberry series and his paintings. Esteemed by Federico Fellini, Stan Lee and Hayao Miyazaki, among others, he received international acclaim. He has been described as the most influential bandes dessinées artist after Hergé.

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

Mœbius contributed storyboards and concept designs to numerous science fiction and fantasy films, such as Alien, Tron, The Fifth Element and The Abyss. In 2004, Moebius and Jodorowsky sued Luc Besson for using The Incal as inspiration for Fifth Element, a lawsuit which they lost.Blueberry was adapted for the screen in 2004 by French director Jan Kounen.

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.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.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.

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.

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.

Throughout his career he used drugs and cultivated 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.
[from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Gi...]

Music: Robert Rich "Erasing Traces"