Iznogoud - 'Dali Baba et ses Toiles Magiques'.
Elric is a French comic artist and musician, active in the Angoulême small press scene, and (co-)author of graphic novels like 'Marche ou Rêve' (Dargaud, 2011), 'Harpignies' (Paquet, 2014) and 'Romance' (Delcourt, 2021). Several of his comics refer to classic comics and pop culture characters. Since 2021, he is the third artist to draw the long-running humor series 'Iznogoud'.
Early life and career
Elric Dufau was born in 1983 in Perpignan, in the south of France, near the Spanish border. He studied Fine Arts, graduating with a National Diploma in Plastic Arts (DNAP, 2006) and then a Higher National Diploma of Plastic Expression (DNSEP, 2008). Already during his education, he was publishing his art on blogs and in self-published mini-comics like 'Pow R & Toc H Se Font Suicider' (2007), a subtle tribute to the Pink Floyd song, graphically influenced by both Disney and Spirou magazine. Several comic stories from Elric's early period were later collected in the comic book 'Peeping Tom et autres histoires' (Le Portillon, 2020). After his graduation, he began working in the comic industry professionally. Among his graphic influences are Floyd Gottfredson and Sempé.
'Harpignies' (2014).
Graphic novels
Elric's first professional entry in the world of comics was penciling the album 'Marche ou Rêve' (Dargaud, 2011), scripted and inked by Laureline Michaut, AKA Laurel. The comic is a coming-of-age story about a 19-year old man spending a holiday at his grandmother's home in Bretagne (Britanny), where he finds out more about his missing father and unknown half brother. With François Darnaudet as scriptwriter, Elric made 'Harpignies' (Paquet, 2014), a graphic novel about the young artist Éric Harpignies, who decides to falsify paintings by real-life 19th-century landscape painter Henri Harpignies (1819-1916). Since 2016, Darnaudet and Elric worked together again on the children's series 'Witchazel' for Éditions Kramiek, about a group of anthropomorphic animals in a forest setting, drawn in a style reminiscent of 1930s cartoon characters and the comics of Raymond Macherot. In 2021, Elric brought out 'Romance' (Delcourt, 2021), a parody of old-fashioned romance comics. Mimicking the look of 1950s and 1960s love and heartbreak comics, Elric adds funny or shocking dialogue, that provides humorous contrast with the deadly serious and static drawings.
Witchazel - 'Le Sort du Wlouf' (2016).
La Psychanalyse
At Éditions Vraoum!, Elric provided artwork for the humor series 'La Psychanalyse des ...', in which the scriptwriter Wandrille offers witty psycho-analytical theories about famous pop culture characters. Élric illustrated the fifth volume, 'La Psychanalyse des Miquets' (Vraoum!, 2011), in which characters from the Mickey Mouse universe are put on the bench, as well as book 6, 'La Psychanalyse des Héros de Romangraphie', focusing on graphic novel characters. Other artists who illustrated the 'Psychanalyse' series have been Wandrille himself, as well as Reuno, Mathieu Vinciguerra, Yoda, Elosterv, Unter, Turalo, Pochep and Matt Dunhill. In 2015, Elric also appeared in the collective volume 'Héros sur Canapés' (Vraoum, 2015).
'La Petite Souris – Trivial Pour Cuite' (2016).
La Petite Souris
One of Elric's more personal creations is 'La Petite Souris', starring the mouse journalist Mathilde. Her comical slice-of-life adventures have appeared in small-press comics, on the French website of the Huffington Post, and in the comic book 'La Petite Souris – Trivial pour Cuite' (Onapratut, 2016).
Marsam-graphics
In December 2015, Elric co-founded the Marsam-graphics atelier in Angoulême, a collective of comic artists associated with the publishing imprint Le Portillon. Other members are Golo, Alain François, Laura Désirée Pozzi and Lucie Durandelle, while international associates are Cynthia Bonacossa (Brazil), Shennawy (Arab countries), Benjamin Frisch (USA) and Giorgia Marras (Italy). The group has participated in several collective expostions.
Iznogoud
Since 2021, Elric is the official artist of the long-running classic comic series 'Iznogoud'. Originally created in 1962 by Jean Tabary and René Goscinny, the series about the evil grand vizier who wants to become "caliph instead of the caliph" was continued by Nicolas Tabary since 2004. He continued the series with different scriptwriters for almost a decade and half, but in 2021 announced his intention to pass the pencil to another artists. Stéphane Beaujean, a representative of IMAV Éditions, noticed Elric's comics on social networks and contacted him for the job. After a few try-outs, he was accepted. Elric went through great lengths to mimick Tabary's style as close as possible. He contacted a former Pif Gadget colleague and personal friend of Tabary, asking him what kind of paper, pen and ink he used. The first 'Iznogoud' album with Elric's participation was 'Moi, Calife...' (2021). In July 2021, he also rebooted the political gag comic starring 'Iznogoud'. Between 1974 and 1979, Jean Tabary and René Goscinny had made a satirical newspaper strip for Journal du Dimanche, in which Iznogoud tackled political, social and economic issues, often directly based on real-life French politics. With Olivier Andrieu as scriptwriter, Elric continued this concept, this time as a webcomic hosted on the website La Vie Française.
Artwork for The Limiñanas (I've Got Trouble In Mind, 2014).
Music
Elric is additionally active as a musician, playing in the band Disorder. He has directed music videos, designed album covers and performed as an on-stage cartoonist with the Perpignan band The Limiñanas, with whom he shares a passion for sixties garage punk, boxset nuggets and psychedelia.
Other activities
Elric has also illustrated for educational books and designed posters for comic festivals. His contributions appeared in collective comic books like 'Les Nouveaux Pieds Nickelés' (Onapratut, 2010), 'Revoilà Popeye' (Onapratut, 2012) and 'Bruss. Brussels in Shorts' (Oogachtend, 2013). He has organized cartooning workshops in schools, hospitals, libraries and prisons, and is since 2011 a teacher at the CESAN School of Comics and Illustration in Paris. He additionally writes essays on comic art for Les Cahiers de la BD magazine.
"Ah! Si J' Étais Ministre de la Santé...", topical Iznogoud strip about COVID vaccinations (La Vie Française, December 2021). The crowd protests against the required vaccinations. Iznogoud "solves" the problem by prohibiting vaccinations, which makes the crowd protest for their right to receive vaccinations instead.