Édourd Aidans was a Belgian comic artist, best known for the realistic series he made for Tintin magazine in the 1950s and 1960s. Born in Andenne, he began his career at the age of 15, when he illustrated a couple of stories in the series 'Les Belles Histoires de l'Oncle Paul' for Spirou magazine. A year later, he began his association with the publishing house Lombard and their magazines Line and Tintin. He initially illustrated several short (historical) stories for these magazines, for which he sometimes used pen names like Jok, Joke and Delcroix.
'Le Chevalier à l'Épervier' (from Flemish Tintin #40, 1955).
Aidans became a more prominent artist of Tintin in 1960, when 'Le Dossier Vert', the serial he made with J. and F. Gall, debuted. That same year, he created the humorous reporter 'Bob Binn' with scriptwriter André-Paul Duchâteau and later Jacques Acar. In addition to the comics, 'Bob Binn' also became a regular character in Tintin's games section.
'Marc Franval'.
In 1962, Aidans came up with the realistic Stone Age hero 'Tounga', for which he also wrote the texts. Books were published by Lombard between 1964 and 1986, followed by a final installment in 1995. Aidans created a third series, 'Marc Franval' (also known as 'Les Franval'), which was scripted by Jacques Acar and later Yves Duval between 1963 and 1974. With Greg, he created 'Les Panthères' in Tintin between 1971 and 1975. During the height of his production for Tintin, he also served as a mentor for debuting comic artists like Marc Hardy, Chris Lamquet and Magda.
'Les Panthères'.
While continuing to work for Tintin, Aidans was also present in Pilote with 'Alex Vainclair', a serial scripted by Duchâteau, in 1965. By 1975-1976 he also drew the feature 'Gour le Ba-Lourh' for Achille Talon Magazine. Aidans began a collaboration with magazine Super-As in 1979, and the action series 'Tony Stark' with Jean Van Hamme. Six book collections were published by Fleurus, Edi-3, Hachette and Novedi between 1979 and 1982.
He made the historical series 'La Toile et la Dague' with Jean Dufaux for the publishing house Dargaud between 1986 and 1989.
Aidans was one of several artists to make a graphic contribution to ‘Pepperland’ (1980), a collective comic book tribute to the store Pepperland, to celebrate its 10th anniversary at the time. In 1987-1988 the publishing company Brain Factory International released a four-volume comic book series where Franco-Belgian comic authors visualized several songs by singer Jacques Brel in comic strip form. The third volume, 'Ces Gens-là' (1988) featured a contribution by Aidans. In 1990 Aidans paid graphic tribute to François Walthéry in the collective homage book 'Natacha. Special 20 Ans' (Marsu Productions, 1990), which celebrated the 20th anniversary of Walthéry's series 'Natacha'.
With Brice Tarvel, he made the fantasy comic 'Arkan', of which one book was published by Vaisseau d'Argent in 1990. He worked with Greg again on two new stories starring 'Bernard Prince' for Éditions Blanco in 1992 and 1999. The second story was also serialized in Vers l'Avenir.
He used the pseudonym Hardan for his feature 'Les Saintes Nitouches' that ran in the erotic magazine Klin Deuil from 1995, and was published in the BD Folies series by P&T Productions between 1995 and 1998. In 2007, he worked with Yves Duval on a comic book about tennis player Justine Henin for Dupuis Productions. In 1991 he was knighted by king Boudewijn/ Baudouin as a Knight in the Order of Leopold.
'Tony Stark'.