S.K. Collection - Lot 6

S.K. Collection MOEBIUS ARZAK Le Petit Panthéon Moebius, Arzak, Moebius Productions 2023 Original illustration. Signed. India ink and colored inks on paper 46 × 60.8 cm (18.11 × 23.94 in.) The impact of Arzak, published by Moebius in 1975 in the first issues of Métal Hurlant, on the world of comics is unimaginable. This Apollonian work (according to Nietzsche's definition) marks a clear break in the history of comics. With this mute horseman perched on a pteroid, Jean Giraud abruptly breaks with classical storytelling to invent a language of pure vision, free from the dialogue and narrative codes inherited from the soap opera. The image becomes everything: it tells, breathes, meditates... What Arzak proposes is a comic strip as an inner experience. Far from the chattering adventures of traditional Franco-Belgian comics, Moebius opens up a metaphysical breach in this universe dominated by adventure. In these silent plates, each frame seems suspended between dream and abstraction. The reader no longer "reads" a story: he crosses a mental space, a desert populated by signs. This radical approach transforms the act of reading into contemplation, if not awe. Every Moebius drawing is like a prayer. "A poem", said Le Monde critic Jacques Goimard. Graphically, Arzak condenses all the genius of Moebius: a stroke of implacable limpidity - "a control of the uncontrolled" as art critic Pierre Sterckx described it - and a rare sense of silence. This new grammar set the tone for a whole generation of creators, not just in comics: Ridley Scott, Hayao Miyazaki, Guillermo Del Toro and Luc Besson were all influenced by this approach. The secret of this fascination is the culture of mystery. Each drawing is like a Rorschach test: by appealing to the reader's projective capacity, each detail activates unconscious aspects of his or her psyche. Who is he, then, this individual who questions you with his eyes? What civilization does he come from, with his skilfully crafted suit of soft lines? What's that long stick in his hand? Is it lethal? Is it magic? What is the meaning of his gaze? Menacing? Inquisitive? And then there's the silence, impressive and challenging. In time and space. Didier Pasamonik