In memoriam Testu Roger "Tetsu" (1913-2008)

Jean-Marie sent me a mail with the message the famous French cartoonist Tetsu died last week-end. He included 2 pictures of drawings out of his private collection. Tetsu was 94.
Tetsu (who was also a painter, illustrator and novelliste) started drawing in the French press in 1951 (in a total of sixty papers and magazines). He has also drawn in the foreign press: Le Soir (Belgium); Lui, Pardon (Germany); Il travaso (Italy).
In France, he has published 12 cartoon books. The last, in 2004, was entitled "Mauvais Desseins."

In Who's Who in Satire and Humour Band1, I found this information about Tetsu:
Testu's father was a railway inspector who had actually intended his son to become a professor. the son who, for his part, intended to become an artist, pursued both courses, graduating from the Lycee Condorcet and the Faculté des Lettres in Paris, whilst simultaneously studying painting from 1931-1933. The pre-war years were not very successful ones for Testu the artist and, after serving during the war and the period of occupation, he worked as a soap-boiler; becoming the first director of a soap factory, then a dealer in paintings with his own gallery and, finally, commercial director of a company supplying kitchen equipment. In 1953 he gave up his previous activities and began quite out of the blue to draw cartoons which were successful from the very outset. They first appeared in "Noir et Blanc" and soon afterwards also in "Le Figaro Magazine", "France-Dimanche", "Paris Match"... as well as in German and Suiss publications. Apart form his work as an artist and illustrator, he draws advertisements for some big companies. The artist belongs to the so-called Paris School which also includes illustrators as Chaval, Bosc, Trez and Mose. His popularity is founded on the fact that he never draws sex bombs and supermen, but rather Mr. an Mrs. Average types with whom we are all fimiliar.


Read more:
Tetsu article on the blog of cartoonist Mike Lynch
More "Tetsu" cartoons on the Mike Lynch blog
[Who's Who in Satire and Humour Band1 cartoonbook file]