'Les Nombrils'.
Marc Delafontaine, who signs with Delaf, was born in Sherbrooke in Quebec, Canada. He has made illustrations for folders aimed at people with French as their second language, and he worked in the field of animation as a lay-out and storyboard artist for a long time. He also made illustrations for children's publications and published comics in magazines and anthologies from Québec, such as La Turbine. Delaf illustrated four installments in the series 'Nous, les jeunes!', thirteen more for the collection 'BD Junior', and was a colorist for the magazine Pignouf and the publishing house Mille-Iles.
'Le Guide Junior Pour Bien Élever les Parents' by Jacky Goupil and Sylvia Douyé for the Collection Humour of the publishing house Vents d'Ouest in 2005. He has been working extensively with his partner Maryse Dubuc, starting with the creation of the character 'Smoofee' in Bédélirium in 1995. Their best known creation is however 'Les Nombrils', a popular gag series about three teenage girls, from 2004. After publication in the Quebec magazine Safarir, the strip is featured in the Belgian Spirou magazine and published in book format by Dupuis. The series is also published in the English language as 'The Bellybuttons' by Cinebook.
On 17 March 2022, it was announced that a new album of the long terminated gag comic 'Gaston Lagaffe' would be released in the fall of that year, titled 'Le Retour de Lagaffe' and drawn by Delaf. This would be the first new album in the series since the death of creator André Franquin in 1997. Yet soon after, Franquin's daughter Isabelle sued Dupuis for copyright infringement and plagiarism, claiming that her father didn't want his signature comic to be continued by anybody after his death. On 16 May 2022, Dupuis announced that it would postpone the publication until further notice. The definitive legal verdict is expected in September.
Delaf was a strong influence on Coco Ouwerkerk.
'Les Nombrils'.