Exhibition / Sale at Galerie 9eme Art

The black and white bibliophile edition of the Blake and Mortimer special edition “le Dernier Pharaon”, which will be released on 22 November 2019 by Dargaud, closes an adventure born more than four years ago.

To extend and accompany the publication of this book, Galerie 9ème Art, in partnership with Blake and Mortimer Publishing, is exhibiting eight alternative versions of the album's plates from 23 November to 8 December 2019.

Photos below by Théo Strato ¹⁾.

Forty years ago, on the occasion of the release of “Aux médianes de Cymbiola”, Claude Renard and François Schuiten met Edgar-Pierre Jacobs, who revealed to them, seeing this book in pencil, that he would always have liked to draw in this technique, very inspired as it was, by the German expressionist movement. But this graphic form was not desired by Hergé for Le Journal Tintin. On the occasion of this exhibition, François Schuiten takes up the desire of this author whom he has admired for so long.

Charcoal on digital printing with dark inks

For each print, enlarged and unique, the designer reconsidered his work with a pen, and rethought it in a mixed technique (charcoal, ink, acrylic), to get closer to the photography of the films of Fritz Lang and Robert Wiene. To renew the gaze on the plate, the author has chosen a monumental format (110×90 cm) that allows to truly penetrate the image and the dynamics of its composition.

François Schuiten worked on these pages during the summer of 2019. It took Schuiten two days per page to alter it to his likings ²⁾.

The exhibition consists of 8 single prints, reworked with mixed techniques: Charcoal, ink and acrylic. Large format (110×90 cm). Sold framed with anti-reflective glass with large format bedspread. Price 4.500 euros.

• page 33
• page 39
• page 43
• page 58
• page 66
• page 71
• page 84
• page 100

And two unique digital print without enhancements. Sold framed with anti-reflective glass, also 110×90 cm. Price 1.200 euros ³⁾.

• la fête de la BD à Bruxelles
• les rendez-vous de la BD à Amiens

Francois Schuiten wanted to turn the original black and white images into greyscales. Below you can see four examples of the original image (left) and the unique piece Schuiten turned it into (right).

Pictures of the original and the unique piece are made by Nicolas Rivoal ⁴⁾.

The opening of the exhibition took place on Friday November 22, 2019.

Photos by Atlantic12 ⁵⁾, François Schuiten ⁶⁾, Nicolas Rivoal ⁷⁾ and Editions Dargaud ^{8) 9)}.