'Les Dézingueurs'.
Jean Barbaud is a French illustrator, character designer and comic artist specializing in comical aviation subjects. Since the 1970s, he has worked for animation studios like Procidis and DIC, notably developing the characters for the educational 'Il Était Une Fois... L'Homme' ('Once Upon a Time... Man') TV series (1978-1979) and its many follow-ups. Later in his career, he was also involved in a comic book adaptation of the series. From the 1980s on, Barbaud has been mostly active as an illustrator in the field of aviation, notably for the magazine Le Fana de l'Aviation. In the same genre, he has been the artist for the comic series 'Lieutenant Mac Fly' (Delcourt, 1999-2001) and 'Les Dézingeurs' (Bamboo, 2009-2013).
Early life and career
Jean Barbaud was born in 1955 in Cholet, a commune in the Maine-et-Loire department of western France. After high school, he studied advertising design at the École Brassart in Tours, and subsequently began his career as a freelance illustrator.
Volumes of the 1978-1979 book series based on 'Il Était Une Fois... L'Homme'.
Once Upon a Time... Man
Around 1976, Brbaud was recruited through a competition by the Polish-French television producer Albert Barillé, who had gained his first success earlier that decade with the stop-motion puppet series 'Les Aventures de Colargol' (1970-1974). At Barillé's production company Procidis, Barbaud served as the character designer for the animated edutainment series 'Il Était une Fois... l'Homme' ('Once Upon a Time... Man', 1978-1979). In 26 episodes, the series told the history of mankind throughout the ages, often from different viewpoints, depending on the background of the characters. Covering history from the origins of life through the end of the 20th century, each episode portrayed a same cast of characters in a different historical setting. Serving as the series mascot and narrator was the Maestro, a wise elderly man almost fully covered by his big, bushy beard. He was voiced by Roger Carel, who was also the voice of Astérix in the animated adaptations of Albert Uderzo's comic series 'Astérix'. In many scenes he is shown talking to a group of children about historical events and eras, which are shown in flashbacks. The "good" characters are the hardworking husband Pierre and his protective wife Pierrette, who have two children: Pierrot and Pierrette. Pierre is good friends with the friendly strongman Le Gros (Jumbo), while Pierrot's best friend is Le Gros' son, Petit Gros. The recurring villains are the bully Le Teigneux (The Pest) and a sneaky little runt with fiery red hair, Le Nabot (The Dwarf), who are both portrayed as adults and as children. Another cast member is an anthropomorphic clock who indicates the year of the on-screen events. Naturally, famous historical characters also played significant roles, but the focus remains on the effect of historical events on everyday life.
Co-produced and distributed internationally, 'Once Upon a Time... Man' was a success from the start, winning the 1979 Soleil d'Or in the category of "Best Youth Program". Several reissues have come about in the following decades. Prompted by the success of the series, Barillé and his team created several sequel series with the same educational tone, often with the same set of characters, created by Jean Barbaud. These follow-ups included 'Il Était une Fois... l'Espace' ('Once Upon a Time... Space', 1982-1983), 'Il Était une Fois... la Vie' ('Once Upon a Time... Life', 1986-1987), 'Il Était une Fois... les Amériques' ('Once Upon a Time... The Americas', 1991-1993), 'Il Était une Fois... les Découvreurs' ('Once Upon a Time... The Discoverers', 1994), 'Il Était une Fois... les Explorateurs' ('Once Upon a Time... The Explorers', 1996-1997), 'Il Était une Fois... Notre Terre' ('Once Upon a Time... Planet Earth', 2008) and 'Il Était une Fois... Ces Drôles d'Objets' ('Once Upon a Time... The Objects', 2024).
Almost all of these series centered on history, except for 'Il Était une Fois... L'Espace', which was a straightorward science fiction series, and 'Il Était une Fois... La Vie', which focused on how the human body works. From 1982 on, most of the music for 'Il Était une Fois' was composed by Michel Legrand, previously famous for scoring various live-action films, both in France ('Les Demoiselles de Rochefort') and in Hollywood ('The Thomas Crown Affair', 'The Go-Between', 'Summer of '42', 'Yentl', 'Never Say Never Again'). Legrand also scored the animated feature 'La Flûte à Six Schtroumpfs' ('The Smurfs and the Magic Flute', 1976), based on Peyo's comic series 'The Smurfs'. The title song of 'Íl Était une Fois... La Vie' was sung by Belgian pop musician Sandra Kim, who'd won the Eurovision Song Context that same year with the single 'J'Aime La Vie'.
Barbaud was also involved in the creation of Barillé's 'La Revanche des Humanoïdes' ('Revenge of the Humanoids' (1983), a feature film by Albert Barillé based on episodes of 'Once Upon a Time... Space'. Also involved in the art department of this production were Barbaud's wife Afroula Hadjiyannakis and his friend Philippe Bouchet (Fifi Manchu), both as set designers.
Il Était une Fois l'Homme #11 - 'Les Etrusques et Rome'.
Once Upon a Time... Adaptations
Since the late 1970s, 'Once Upon a Time... Man' has been adapted in several book formats. The first two series were published in 1978 and 1979 by Éditions Ytra, featuring mostly stills from the TV series with additional graphics by Barbaud. In 1982, 'Il Était une Fois... l'Espace' was adapted into four comic books, published by Sogemo and drawn by an unknown artist. In the following year, Sogemo also released an art book for the 'La Revanche des Humanoïdes' film.
During the 1990s, Fabbri-Hachette and Procidis released new book series based on 'Il Était une Fois... l'Homme' (40 volumes, 1991-1992) and 'Il Était une Fois... La Vie' (65 volumes, 1995), all illustrated booklets of 30 pages with graphics from the series and additional illustrations by Barbaud, Dominique Petter ('L'Homme') and Angel Beaumont ('La Vie'). It wasn't until 2016 before Éditions Soleil released both 'Il Était Une Fois... l'Homme' (6 volumes, 2016-2019) and 'Il Était une Fois... La Vie' (4 volumes, 2017-2018) as actual comic book series, scripted by Jean-Charles Gaudin with artwork by Barbaud and the Indian art studio Minte. In 2022, Soleil additionally released a comic adaptation of 'La Revanche des Humanoïdes', scripted by Christophe Lambert with artwork by Sandro Pizziolo (pencils) and Valeria Orlando (inking).
'Il Était une Fois... l'Homme' #16 - 'Les Mérovingiens'.
DIC
In addition to working for Procidis in the 1970s, Barbaud also worked as a designer for DIC, a Tours-based animation studio, led by Jean Chalopin and director Bernard Deyriès. Other artists on the art team were Philippe Bouchet and Bruno Bianchi. With the latter, Barbaud notably worked on the character design of the classic 1980s TV series 'Inspector Gadget' (1983-1986). Later DIC productions with his participation as either character designer, background designer or storyboard artist were 'Rock 'n' Wrestling' (1985-1986), 'Sylvanian Families' (1987) and 'The Wacky World of Tex Avery' (1997).
'Les Tigres Volants' (Sapristi #9).
Small press comics
In his spare time, Barbaud became active in the Tours scene of comic fanzines. Together with his DIC colleagues Philippe Bouchet (Manchu), Bruno Bianchi (B.Burn's) and Marie-Pierre Journet, additionally joined by their friend Patrick Lavaud, Barbaud launched Basket Bitume, a juvenile zine mixing science fiction, vague political undertones and lowbrow humor. Its mascot was a rather obscene goat with protruding udders. In January 1979, Basket Bitume won a "Saucisson Smith" Award at the Angoulême Comics Festival. Due to an error, the prize was shared with the P.L.G.P.P.U.R. fanzine of Philippe Morin et Pierre-Marie Jamet. During the early 1980s, Barbaud also contributed comic pages to the French comic fanzine Sapristi!, published by the Normandy Comics Association (ANBD). In 1987, Barbaud also created the comic book 'Histoire de Châtellerault en Bandes Dessinées', commissioned by the Junior Chamber of Commerce of the Châtelleraudais region.
Cartoon for Le Fana de l'Aviation, 2019.
Aviation artist
After the 'Once Upon a Time... Space' series, Barbaud became a specialist in the field of aviation art. Since 1983, he has been a cartoonist for Le Fana de l'Aviation, a specialized monthly for aviation enthusiasts. His cartoons also appeared in the book 'Pur Zing' (La Sirène, 1993), an encyclopedic exploration of aviation in collaboration with writer Thierry Cailleteau. In 2001, the book was reprinted by Vents d'Ouest under the title 'Gueules de Zings'. With writer Alexandra Zainal, he made a similarly illustrated book about flying firefighters, 'Pompiers en Zings' (Mosquito, 2004). Further collections with Barbaud's aviation artwork have been 'Les Dents de la Guerre' (Bamboo, 2009), 'Sketchbook Barbaud' (Comix Buro, 2010) and 'Drôles de Zings' (Bamboo, 2016). At Éditions Paquet, Barbaud illustrated two volumes of the children's picture book series 'Aéroclub des Colibris' (2014-2015). Written by Sidonie Farjon, the books feature the adventures of the little propeller aircraft Oscar and his anthropomorphic airplane friends from the Hummingbird Flying Club.
Aéroclub des Colibris #2 - 'Un Solo Qui Décoiffe' (2015).
Since the late 1990s, Barbaud has also taken his talent for drawing hilariously caricatural airplanes to the medium of comics. With writer Fred Duval, he created the goofy adventures of 'Lieutenant Mac Fly' (Delcourt, 1999-2003), about an ace American test pilot controlling aircraft from all eras. In 2016, the three volumes were collected in one compilation book by Éditions Paquet. Between 2009 and 2013, he worked on another aviation-themed humor comic, this time in collaboration with writer Hervé Richez at Éditions Bamboo: 'Les Dézingueurs', about a special but highly incompetent squadron of the US Air Force somewhere in the Pacific.
The regular colorist of Jean Barbaud's comics is his wife, Afroula Hadjiyannakis.
Lieutenant Mac Fly #1 - 'Que l'Air Force soit avec vous!' (1999).