'L'Étrange Aventure de Tom-Tom aux Amériques' (Bravo!, 1940).
Constant Dratz was an early to mid-20th century Belgian artist and painter, best-known for his illustrations for the worker's movement and his paintings of Belgian landscapes. During World War II, he made cover illustrations for the weekly magazines Bonnes Soirées, and also illustrated tales for Bravo!.
Life
Constant Dratz was born in 1875 in Laeken, a town in the Brussels Capital Region of Belgium. He was married twice, first to Blanche Marguerite Frezin and then to Claire Förster. His son was the painter, cartoonist and editor Jean Dratz (1905-1967). Constant Dratz lived in Vorst and Vilvoorde, but his longest home base was Dilbeek, a rural town in the Pajottenland region. For many years, his nextdoor neighbor was the Belgian painter Jean Brusselmans; their street was later renamed to the latter. Constant Dratz died in Dilbeek on 3 September 1946 (several online sources erroneously list 1930 as the year of Constant Dratz's death). Together with his second wife, he is buried at the Dilbeek cemetery.
Artwork for the worker's movement during the 1925 elections. The propaganda poster points out that in 1921, under "four socialist ministers", a family could afford two pieces of bread for 1.70 Belgian francs. Four years later, under a "clerical-liberal" government, the same family can only afford one bread.
Fine artist
As a painter, Dratz was known for his landscape paintings of the Dilbeek countryside. Using varying techniques, including lithography, woodcut and dry needle, Dratz also painted portraits of famous Belgians like the poet and Nobel Prize laureate Maurice Maeterlinck, politician Paul Janson, musician Eugène Ysaÿe and the novelist Camille Lemonnier. In 1905, he received a Silver medal at the Universal and International Exhibition in Liège in the category "Stained Glass and Wallpaper". His career as illustrator and graphic artist was mainly dedicated to the worker's movement, most notably posters for the 1925 elections and artwork for the Trade Union Commission. His paintings for the 1924 International Cooperative Exhibition in the Citadelpark in Ghent adorned for many years the top chambers of the large meeting room in the Textile Center of the General Belgian Trade Union in Ghent. They are nowadays part of the collection of the Ghent Museum of Industry.
Front and back cover art by Constant Dratz for Les Bonnes Soirées of 3 March 1935.
Bravo!
During the 1930s, Dratz worked as cover illustrator for the women's weekly Bonnes Soirées, published by Éditions Jean Dupuis. Later, he illustrated stories in Bravo!, a children's magazine printed in Belgium by the Dutch publisher Jan Meuwissen. Before the war, Bravo! had been filled mainly with translated American comics, but during the Nazi occupation, it relied largely on local artists. Appearing in both French and Dutch, Bravo! contained early work by famous Belgian cartoonists such as Edgar P. Jacobs, Jacques Laudy and Leo de Budt. Its art director was Jean Dratz, the son of Constant Dratz, who most likely also recruited his father.
Besides illustrating text stories, Constant Dratz is also identified as the original artist of the adventure comic feature 'L'Étrange Aventure de Tom-Tom aux Amériques' ("The Curious Adventure of Tom-Tom in the Americas"). Written by Raymond Duquenne, the feature was serialized from December 1940 until the first semester of 1941. In a dream, a young man called Tom-Tom is forced to serve as a guinea pig for an elixir of old age, developed by an old scientist in a castle in Arizona. However, with a different dosage, it can become an elixir of youth. With the help of his dog Ric-Rac, who mixes the elixirs, Tom-Tom manages to escape. He goes home to his parents and, when he wakes up, tells his adventure to his dog. Dratz drew only the first six episodes of the story. He was succeeded by L. Neyaert for installments 8 through 11.
Artwork for the Belgian worker's movement. The first poster promotes the International Exhibition of Cooperation, held between 15 June and 15 September. The second one rallies for a demonstration, set for 26 November 1922.