'Simon Nian'.
Yves Rodier is a French-Canadian comic artist and animator, who gained notoriety as a Hergé fan and pastiche artist. He is well known for creating a bootleg version of the final unfinished 'Tintin' story 'Tintin and the Alpha Art' (1991). His best known own comic series are 'Simon Nian' (2005) and 'El Spectro' (2011-2013).
Early life
Rodier was born in 1967 in Farnhem in the Quebec region Montérégie. He grew up reading comics from the 1950s and 1960s, which he found in his brother's old copies of the magazines Tintin and Spirou. He also read Pif Gadget and especially enjoyed reading Hergé's 'Tintin' and 'Astérix' by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo. Despite his passion for comics, he ended up studying music and later cinematographic techniques at the Cégep in St-Hyacinthe.
Sample from Yves Rodier's version of 'Tintin et L'Alph-Art' (1991).
Tintin et L'Alph Art
He eventually returned to comics, starting with a fan project of completing Hergé's unfinished story 'Tintin et L'Alph Art' in 1986. The Hergé Foundation forbid the publication of Rodier's tribute, but the artist did use the work to present himself to publishers. A pirate edition appeared in 1991 however, and several translated versions still circulate on the web. Rodier's ability to reproduce the style of Hergé gained him a certain recognition in Europe, and got him in touch with European artists like Bob De Moor, François Walthéry, Jacques Martin and Greg. He gave interviews to Belgian newspapers and had regular appearances in Stéphane Steeman's fanzine Les Amis De Hergé. He has continued to draw Hergé's characters for postcards, prints and other illustrations, without the knowledge or approval of the Hergé Foundation, who continued to claim that Hergé's characters died with their master.
Pignouf et Hamlet
In 1995, Rodier was asked by editors Daniel and Richard Houde to join the team of Pignouf magazine, and was assigned to draw the title comic 'Pignouf et Hamlet' from scripts by Daniel Houde (who used the pen name David). The magazine only lasted for five issues, but the series was continued in the book 'La Bande Sauvage' at the publishing house Mille-Îles in 2000. A second book called 'La Grippe du Tigre' remained unfinished. Yves Rodier won the "Espoir Québécois" prize for most promising local artist at the Québec comic festival of 1996 for his work for Pignouf and his Hergé tributes.
Other activities
After the demise of Pignouf, Rodier moved to France, where he went to work in the animation industry. He did lay-outs and poses for productions like 'L'Aventure de l'Écriture', 'Bob Morane', 'Papyrus' (based on Lucien de Gieter's comic strip) and 'Fantômette' (which was adapted into a comic strip by François Craenhals). He was a storyboard artist for the film 'Heavy Metal 2000', the series 'Les Aventures d'une Mouche' (based on the Lewis Trondheim comic), and for the animated series with André Franquin's 'Marsupilami'.
Rodier returned to comics in 2005 with the series about attorney at law 'Simon Nian', which is published by Éditions Glénat. Written by François Corteggiani, the comic shows clear influences from Maurice Tillieux. Both Tillieux and Jean Graton were influences on Rodier's next project about a Mexican wrestler, 'El Spectro', which was written in cooperation with Frédéric Antoine. Two albums were published by Le Lombard, the first in 2011 and the second in 2013.
