Les Nouvelles Aventures de Barbe-Rouge #1 - 'Pendu Haut et Court!' (Dutch edition, 2020). ©Carloni/Kraehn/Dargaud.
Stefano Carloni is an Italian comic artist. After debuting in the Italian comic book industry, he went to work for French and Belgian publishers, specializing in historical comics with comic biographies for Éditions Glénat and short-lived series like 'Les Savants' (2016). Since 2020, he works with writer Jean-Charles Kraehn on new volumes of the classic pirate comic 'Barbe-Rouge' for publisher Dargaud.
Early life
Stefano Carloni was born in 1988 in Filottrano, a village in the province of Ancona, not far from the Adriatic coast. Since no one in his family liked comics, he only discovered the medium later in life. Graduating in 2010 from the International School of Comics in Jesi, Carloni developed a style that combined liveliness with the precision of historical drawing. Among his main inspirations are the classic creators Sergio Toppi and Atilio Micheluzzi. Later on, he also underwent influence from the Franco-Belgian comics by Jean Giraud, Hermann, Enrico Marini, Mathieu Lauffray, François Boucq, Alex Alice and Juanjo Guarnido.
Italian career
After graduation, Carloni began his career working for Italian publishers, starting with a short story for EMI Edizioni in 2010. In the following year, he did a story for the August 2011 issue of the esoteric thriller series 'L'Insonne', written by Francesco Matteuzzi for Edizioni Arcadia, and began doing cover art for publisher Manfont. He then contributed as a colorist to publications of Moretti Compact. In 2012, Carloni illustrated the second and fourth issue of the legal thriller mini-series 'Law - Il Lato Oscuro della Legge' (2012) for Star Comics, written by Davide G. G. Caci and Giorgio Salati. The other issues had artwork by Paolo Antiga, Ennio Bufi, Paola Camoriano, Salvatore Coppola, Beniamino Del Vecchio and Enza Fontana. Since 2012, Stefano Carloni has also been a teacher with the Scuola Internazionale di Comics in Jesi.
Les Savants #1 - ''Ferrare, 1512 - Du Plomb en Or' (2016).
Franco-Belgian publishers
To expand his career opportunities, Carloni set out to present his work to Franco-Belgian publishing houses at the comic festivals of Lucca and Angoulême. It landed him his first assignment with the Swiss publisher Paquet, drawing the sole volume of the car racing series 'Siclair' (2014), written by Laurent-Frédéric Bollée. While he was working on this album, he was contacted by Éditions Soleil to draw 'Les Savants' (2016), a diptych starring medieval scientists, written by Luca Blengino. In the first volume, 'Ferrare, 1512 - Du Plomb en Or', Copernicus and Paracelsus investigate a homicide. The setting for the second installment, 'Uraniborg, 1594 - La Bête de l'île', was Sweden, where Galileo and Kepler investigate through snowy landscapes and a labyrinth of castles. Meeting with positive critical reception and international translations, the series enhanced Carloni's visibility, and resulted in his ongoing association with the Daniel Maghen art gallery.
'Léon le Grand - Défier Attila' (2019).
Historical comics
Continuing in the genre of historical comics, from the late 2010s on Carloni worked with writer Renaud Dély on a comic biography of 19th-century French physician, journalist and statesman Georges Clémenceau, published in 2017 in the series 'Ils Ont Fait l'Histoire' ("They Made History") by publisher Glénat. For another historical collection of the same publisher, 'Un Pape dans l'Histoire' ("A Pope in History"), he drew the installment about Pope Leo the Great ('Léon le Grand - Défier Attila', 2019) from a script by France Richemond. In between those two projects, Carloni joined publisher Dargaud for illustrating the second volume of 'Le Nouveau Monde' (2018), a historical adventure series written by François Armanet and Jean Helpert about a 16th-century Spanish priest sent to the New World to evangelize the Native Americans. The first volume of the series had been drawn by Xavier Coyère.
Barbe-Rouge
By now an established specialist in historical comics, Carloni was hired by Éditions Dargaud to draw the 2020 reboot of the classic pirate comic 'Barbe-Rouge'. Originally created in 1959 by Jean-Michel Charlier and Victor Hubinon, the comic had appeared with longer and shorter intervals until 2004, with several writers and artists contributing over the years. After a fifteen-year hiatus, the series was relaunched under the title 'Les Nouveaux Aventures de Barbe-Rouge', featuring Carloni's artwork from scripts by Jean-Charles Kraehn. As an Italian, Carloni initially knew the series from the 1998 broadcasts of the cartoon series, and didn't read the comics until the complete series was published in Italy in 2014. While staying true to the series' roots, Carloni and Kraehn have delivered a modernized and more dynamic version of the classic series, introducing Barbe-Rouge, his son Éric and the crew of the Black Falcon to a new generation of comic readers.
Cover illustration for the 'Barbe-Rouge' album 'Les Chiens de Mer' (2021). ©Carloni/Kraehn/Dargaud.