Barbarella by J-C Forest

This early Barbarella page by Jean-Claude Forest was published in 1964 in V Magazine which originally serialized the series starting in 1962. This was then collected and part of the first Tome of Barbarella and later saw reprinting several times including in early editions of Heavy Metal in English. The comic was originally considered scandalous because of the sexuality involved but later became associated with the sexual revolution of the 60's and women's liberation. Barbarella is now an icon and her influence is wide sweeping and part of popular culture having inspired movies, plays and serving as inspiration for music (Duran Duran is named after a Barbarella character among other references by other bands). I have always been drawn to the loose, stylistic approach taken by Forest and others of this genre like Gigi as it fit the sci-fi themes and monochrome printing well. Although rather large, this page is not as big as some of the later pages in this series which I understand can be poster sized or larger. I am very happy to add this landmark page to my humble collection of European masters.

I have had another nice Forest illustration from V in my collection that has been framed and hanging in our bedroom for years. You can find it in this same gallery.