S.K. Collection - Lot 8

S.K. Collection ENKI BILAL La Foire aux immortels, Dargaud 1980 Original plate no. 36, prepublished in Pilote Mensuel n° 71, April 1980. Signed. India ink and acrylic on paper 28.5 × 40.2 cm (11.22 × 15.83 in.) Alcide Nikopol, a former soldier cryogenically frozen for thirty years and reintroduced in 2023 to a dystopian Paris ruled by an authoritarian regime, is the tragic, manipulated hero of La Foire aux immortels. His mind is controlled by the Egyptian god Horus, who hopes to use him to regain the position from which he has fallen. At the heart of this masterful tale of science fiction, mythology and political satire, Bilal creates a disenchanted character who doesn't recognize himself in this rogue future. What's astonishing in this panel, where the authorities begin to realize what's going on behind the appearance of a pyramid above the city, is this blend of elements from the past - black-and-white television, the somewhat visionary futuristic hints of fascism and Sovietism, but also evocations of millennia-old Egyptian myths - and a technologically advanced present. A narrative clash marvelously translated by Bilal's powerful graphics and his ability to make materials shine in his direct color, whether in the modeling of grays or in the brilliant colors of the gods, whose presence is suspected...