'Les Aventures de Tick'.
Jean Blondeau - who mostly signed with "Mary" - was a French industrial designer and press cartoonist. Cartooning from the 1930s through the 1970s, he was best-known as a post-war contributor to La Presse and the magazines of Éditions Georges Ventillard (Marius, Le Hérisson, Almanach Vermot, La Vie Parissienne), making cartoons, games and comic strips like 'Mademoiselle Cabriole' and 'Les Aventures de Tick' (1958-1962).
Pre-World War II career
Born in 1910, Jean Blondeau had his first job in a ceramics factory. In 1928, he moved to Paris, where he found employment as an industrial designer. In his spare time, he made cartoons, which he sent to the local press offices. By 1930, his work was picked up, starting with publications in the Sunday newspaper supplement Dimanche Illustré (1930-1931, 1937-1938). Several other magazines and papers followed in the 1930s alone, including the political/literary magazine Marianne (1933-1934), the luxury cinema magazine Pour vous (1934-1939) and J.e.u.n.e.s. (1935-1937). With his sharp humor, he often exposed the weaknesses of modern inventions.
Post-World War II career
Prior to World War II, he mostly signed with his own name, Blondeau, but after the war, he assumed the pen name "Mary". During the 1940s and 1950s, the list of publications that carried his work was expanded to over fifty titles. Among them were the former resistance magazine Ici Paris (1945-1951), the satirical paper Le Grelot (1946-1947), the society magazine Noir et Blanc (1947-1950), the Bonjour Dimanche supplement Le Petit Canard (1948-1949), the medical humor journal Ridendo (1949-1950), the hunting magazine Le Chasseur Français (1955-1958) and the saucy humor periodical La Canebiére Humour Magazine (1955-1963).
A contributor to La Presse Magazine between 1945 and 1962, he created the pantomime comic strips about the inventive 'Mademoiselle Cabriole' and the playful basset hound 'Tick' (200 strips between 1958-1962). Mary was especially a staple of the post-war magazines published by Éditions Georges Ventillard, such as the humor magazines Marius (1947-1957), Le Hérisson (with "spot the differences" features, 1946-1989), L'Almanach Vermot (1948-1957) and the men's magazine La Vie Parisienne (1950-1967).
Jean Blondeau died either in 1975 (Pressibus guide, 1995) or around 1989 (Dico Solo, 2004).
"Capitalism aided by Fascism tending to reduce Abundance" (1936).