Motivation

The mysteries of the universe keep me motivated. I'm gonna keep blogging here until at least the time I get the Pictorial Arts Journal up and running. But fair word of warning: I'm now holding back the very best stuff as content for the Journal.

Jean 'Moebius' Giraud

A Magnificent Gift

The start of a new year can be like opening a magnificent gift.

Moebius (Jean Giraud)

Four Words

 Colorful.

Stunning.

 Fan-tab-la-glorious.

Moebius.

1980

Passing of Another Great Artist

The terribly sad news of the passing of another great artist, Jean 'Moebius' Giraud, brings me back to the blog.

I was in the middle of laying out a graphic tribute to him, when my deadlines pushed that project to a back burner. I bring forward the cover and title page at this time to pay honor to his prolific genius. Down the road I will post the full tribute.

Condolences to his family, friends and fans.

Portals

Portals to and from the Other Realm can open anywhere, as evidenced here. Keep your senses keenly aware at all times.

Moebius — Portal

Strength of Man

'Strength of Man' was the premise of this limited-edition portfolio for select graphic artists to create specific drawings. That was a somewhat nebulous concept that allowed for artistic freedom. I guess so, since most of the artists drew whatever the heck they wanted. Here I'm only showing 6 of the 13 participating artists, and out of this group Will Eisner came closest to following directions, Moebius is my favorite of the batch, and Bill Sienkiewicz was the most honest for disregarding the premise. The artists personally signed each of their plates.

By Any Other Name

I read some time ago (I can't vouch for the accuracy of my memory—but it's all I've got to go on for this) that Jean Giraud, aka Moebius, attempted to reinvent himself for a new series. I think I read that he felt that many people perceived Moebius' work to be dark and intimidating. So with his new production of lighter, spiritually uplifting work, he also used a new signature, a pseudonym of sorts: Jean Gir.

A rose by any other name . . .

Okay, I'm back. I just did some research, which of course is what I should done the first time around. Check down below at the end of this post.

I'm going to quote directly from Randy & Jean-Marc Lofficier:

In 1980, Moebius met French philosopher and spiritualist Jean-Paul Appel-Guery, who had a powerful influence on him and his work during the 1980s. Through Appel-Guery, Moebius also met writer-journalist Paula Salomon, and later young artist Marc Bati. Salomon, with fellow writer Charlie Cooper, wrote a remarkable book on parapsychology, La parapsychologie et Vous, which Moebius illustrated. These illustrations were reprinted in Chaos (Marvel, 1991). For Bati, Moebius eventually co-created and wrote the Altor series, aka The Magic Crystal.

Appel-Guery encouraged Moebius to tap into the more positive zones of his subconscious. "Most of the people that were studying spirituality with Appel-Guery did not know much about comics, but they immediately picked on the morbid, and overall negative feelings that permeated my work," said Moebius. "So I began feeling ashamed, and I decided to do something really different, just to show them that I could do it." And Moebius did just that in stories such as The White Citadel and Double Escape (in Pharagonesia, Marvel, 1988) even creating the new sigature of "Jean Gir."

Visualists

Who knew in the late 70s that Computer Generated Imagery would become the backbone of feature film production? Well, Steven Lisberger did, and from some team vision the movie Tron was conceived and produced, with ground-breaking visual effects.

But as most always is the case, before motion pictures are put into motion, artists are called upon to be visualists, taking high-flying concepts and bringing them to earth, visualizing a semblance of reality, allowing them to truly take flight. In this case a terrific team of technical artists came together to give life to a new way of making films.

Final logo design by Syd Mead, using backlight composite technique by Richard Taylor, John Scheele, Marta Russell and Douglas Eby

An earlier design by Syd Mead

An even earlier concept by Chris Lane

Illustration by Richard Taylor of the carrier bridge in Sark's map of domains

Concept drawing of an electronic cave interior by Harrison Ellenshaw

A background by Peter Mueller

A helmet design by Moebius

And more costume designs by Moebius

A Peter Lloyd colorization of a Moebius character concept

A circuit pattern costume design by Syd Mead

A costume design for 'Yori' by Syd Mead

A costume design for 'Yori' by Moebius

A preproduction illustration by Peter Lloyd based upon Syd Mead's design

Concept design for a Solar Sail by Moebius

The final design for the Solar Sail by Moebius

The Solar Sail parked in its hangar

The concepts go on and on, but this is a good sampling

Star Watcher

This is a well-known work by Moebius. It's one of my favorites of his, so I would be remiss to not include it here.

Much of Moebius' characterization is androgynous in nature, so I'm not sure if this subject is male or female, but I'm really hoping she's female. I like the storyline that this image sets up, but then lets us take it where we want in our imagination.

Be sure to notice that tiny little person down by the feet.

Double Escape

In the last post, there was a comment from Li-An that said...

Where is a one page story where a guy escapes flying from a sort of box.

Well, like I said, Moebius art has lots of examples of defying gravity, or escaping it. I was just showing a sampling of it. But whether this 2 page piece I scanned is the one Li-An refers to or not, it's a beautiful example of loosening the bonds of gravity as a symbol of hope.

Gravity Defying

Like Robert McCall, much of Moebius' work also defies gravity.

I interpret the concept as a symbol of hope.

Meanwhile, Not Too Far Away

Imagine that . . . a few lines of ink can transport your mind to another place and time. I AM on this island.

Moebius

Ruler of the Entire City

Moebius

Fabulous interior perspective — an entirely believable secret citadel.

Les Voilà

Moebius (Jean Giraud) was a source of inspiration to me in the 70s and 80s, compelling me to work with a simpler line in my ink work, which is the opposite of one of my other lifelong inspirations, Walt Kelly—he with the lush thick brushstrokes. I was never obsessed with collecting Mobius, I guess because I didn't love all of his work. But the pieces that I did love have never left my collection yet.

One thing I really love about Moebius panel art is that most of his panels can be isolated from the story, enlarged, and be immensely appreciated on their own merits. The panel below could be a framed print on my wall and be most satisfactory to my sensibilities.

The complex simplicity, the perfect perspective, the sense of depth (that this plane is really in the air), even the sense of mystery (what's unfolding here? What is this place?).

I think I'll post some more of his panel art.

Moebius

Two Profiles

Two profiles, so different, yet I feel compelled to group them.

Moebius — early 1980s

Lucien Victor Guirand _ Head of Lady in Medieval Costume — 1900