Christian Gaty

After his studies in fine arts, Christian Catignol learned the finer points of the comic profession from Raymond Poïvet. In 1947, he took on the pseudonym Gaty and started off his solo career with 'Jack Tremble', as well as some comics biographies in Vaillant. From 1949, he was also active in the daily press. He adapted 'L'Atlantide' in France-Soir, 'Le Forgeron de la Cour Dieu' in Libération, and 'L'Étoile du Soir' and some vertical comics in La Dépêche du Midi. In addition, the Opera Mundi agency distributed his adaptation of 'Cigale de Chine', and he did various comics adaptation of literary works in the collection Mondial Aventures of the Société Parisienne d'Édition.

Gaty had a brief appearance in Pilote in 1960 with 'Le Roman Vrai du Premier Maillot Jaune' and some short historical stories. He specialized in girls comics and began a collaboration with the magazines Le Coq Hardi and Frimousse. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, Christian Gaty cooperated with fellow artist Lucien Nortier on several comics. In Mireille, they did 'Dany, Hôtesse de Paris' scripted by Jean Volsa from 1959 to 1963, and for Le Journal de Mickey, they produced 'Thierry la Fronde' and 'Mademoiselle d'Artagnan'. They created several series for Vaillant, such as 'Robin des Bois', 'Le Grêlé 7/13' and 'Fanfan la Tulipe', written respectively by Jean Ollivier, Roger Lécureux and Jean Sanitas.

Again for Le Journal de Mickey, he cooperated on the series 'Les Espadons' with René Deynis and Denis Sérafini. In 1980, he joined the Five Stars studios, where he worked together with Pierre Le Guen, Philippe Luguy, René Deynis and Max Lenvers. There, he cooperated on 'Albator', a series published in Cap'tain Fulgar at Dargaud. In addition, Gaty cooperated on the collection 'Histoire du Far-West en BD' at Larousse, and succeeded Jijé as the artist of the 'Barbe-Rouge' series from 1982 to 1997. In 1983, he began 'Cogan', written by Ollivier in Le Nouveau Pif. For the same magazine, he adapted the television series 'Blackstar'. In 1988, he illustrated the one-shot 'Rossignol, Citoyen de la Révolution', again with scripts by Ollivier, at Éditions Mesidor.