One of France's most celebrated comic artists is Edmond Baudoin. He has had very limited exposure in North America although he was at the first Toronto Comic Arts Festival in 2003. The above photo is the sketch that he drew for me. Amazing brushwork! Total fearlessness of ink on paper. He spoke no english and I very little french but through gestures he conveyed to me his philosophy of drawing. He started off with the fine details of the face and stated that this was the foundation of the drawing. But then he charged his brush with black liquid chaos and with a 'Big Bang' the universe was created. He announced that that thick bold brush stroke was 'La Vie'!! Life with a capital 'L'!! It sounds a bit cheesy as I write this down but it was inspiring. He has now come out with a new book called Crazyman. It is his take on the Superhero comic and more specifically on Superman. Here is a good write up about it via the Comics Reporter. So hopefully with every publishing company jumping on the graphic novel bandwagon now someone will translate it for us and bring it out here. You can see a translated piece of his work in the Rosetta 2 anthology and the Warburger Anthology. Needless to say that Edmond Baudoin is one of the top comic artists today and should be heralded in that elite pantheon of sequential art.
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