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Peellaert, Guy

Guy Peellaert (1934–2008) was a Belgian artist, painter, illustrator, comic artist and photographer, most famous for the book “Rock Dreams,” and his album covers for rock artists like David Bowie (“Diamond Dogs”) and The Rolling Stones (“It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll”). He also designed film posters for films like “Taxi Driver,” “Paris, Texas,” and “Short Cuts”. In 1974, “Elle” magazine called him the “the Michelangelo of Pop”. And Jim Steranko is quoted as saying, “Guy Peellaert was to Europe what Andy Warhol was to America – except that Guy had more talent!”
Peellaert was one of the very first comic artists to process pop-art influences in his stories. His first comic, “Les Aventures de Jodelle”, was published to thunderous acclaim in France in 1966, and then throughout Europe. The psychedelic cartoon character Jodelle was inspired by the French popstar Sylvie Vartan. In the United States, the book was released through Grove Press by the legendary editor Richard Seaver. While this masterpiece contributed to the emergence of comics as an art form, its influence would spread far beyond the confines of comics.
Peellart’s second comic strip heroine, “Pravda, La Survireuse”, made her debut in January 1967 in “Hara-Kiri,” a magazine that had been making waves in France since 1960 with its corrosive, cynical humor inspired by the American MAD magazine.
Peellaert declared that his new heroine needed to incarnate “the truth about our time,” no less. In a stroke of near-genius author Pascal Thomas translated this ambitious quest for meaning into a single word: Pravda, “truth” in Russian, was of course also the name of the famous propagandistic newspaper. Moreover, “Pravda” sounded a bit like “Provo,” the name of the first rebellious youth movement, which was born in 1965 in the Netherlands and whose battles would extend, from 1968 on, to the rest of the developed world.
In order to create the Pravda character, Peellaert once again opted to appropriate a pre-existing image within contemporary culture. This time his muse took on the appearance of Françoise Hardy, a distinctive pop singer who displayed a conspicuous indepence from the system, which had turned mechanical and childish as the 1960s were ending. With her androgynous face, slender silhouette, and shy attitude as a “reluctant star,” Hardy had managed to seduce both Bob Dylan and Mick Jagger and served as an inspiration to the fashion-avantgarde, from Paco Rabanne to Yves Saint-Laurent.
Peellaert went on to stylize the singer’s basic physical characteristics, intent on transforming her into a mythical avatar of modernity. Jodelle’s rounded, carnal forms were replaced by elasticized bodies with hallucinatory proportions. Pravda, freer and even more provocative than Jodelle, was intended to be an icon of emancipation. Her totemic body was clad in items fashioned out of the same black leather as that worn by the legendary rock rebels. And Pravda’s faithful steed was a cross between a Harley-Davidson and a roaring black panther, complete with steel fangs and claws. If Jodelle might be enjoyed to a background of Beatles songs, Pravda’s interior soundtrack resolutely tilts toward the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, and the Velvet Underground, to which Peellaert was at the time listening nonstop. Peellaert also drew a great deal of inspiration from the Hells Angels, the speed-addicted California outlaws that the young Jack Nicholson, who would later collect Peellaert’s works, immortalized on screen in “Hells Angels on Wheels” in 1967, the same year Pravda was being serialized in “Hara-Kiri” from January to December. When Pravda was published in album form by Eric Losfeld, just as the student rebellion exploded in May of 1968 in Paris, its heroine had already become a cult figure.
Pravda remained a durable inspiration to the European Pop avantgarde, its influence reaching far beyond the boundaries of the comics medium, into such rapidly transforming disciplines as fashion or cinema. This fascinating heroine, an embodiment of young and defiant existential angst, became the muse for an emerging Rock culture, inspiring an array of far-ranging artistic experimentations.
Of 68 Jodelle pages, not a single piece of original artwork is known to have survived. Of 61 Pravda pages, 24 are known to exist, 5 of which are now in museums. The technique developed by Peellaert for Pravda was an extension of Jodelle’s. The most immediately striking aspect of these original pages are the confidence of the black line drawing and the intensity of the colors as reproduced in Hara-Kiri. Those incredible pages measure no less than 61 x 47 cm (24” by 18.5”)!

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PRAVDA, page 71

Art Details

Artist:	Guy Pellaert (All)
Media Type:	Pen and Ink
Art Type:	Interior Page
For Sale Status:	NFS
Views	2168
Comments:	8
Added to Site:	1/1/2018

About the Owner

Rarebit Fiend
Member Since:	February 2005

PRAVDA, page 71
Artist: Guy Pellaert (All)
2168 Views, 8 Comments

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PRAVDA, page 46

Art Details

Artist:	Guy Peellaert (All)
Media Type:	Pen and Ink
Art Type:	Interior Page
For Sale Status:	NFS
Views	2291
Comments:	4
Added to Site:	7/25/2015

About the Owner

Rarebit Fiend
Member Since:	February 2005

PRAVDA, page 46
Artist: Guy Peellaert (All)
2291 Views, 4 Comments

There are 2 Pieces of Art In This Gallery.    

Switch View to Alphabetically by Title

 

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About the Owner Rarebit Fiend Premium Gallery Owner Joined: February 2005 Last Login: September 2025 Ebay Id: rarebit-fiend Country: GERMANY On CAF: Rarebit's Want List Artworks Commented On Liked Art Site Activity on CAF

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