Death of the designer Hermann, pillar of the Journal de Tintin, flayed alive from comics

He was good-natured, smiling and as rebellious as ever. It is with pain and sadness that we learn of the death of the great Belgian designer Hermann. A pillar of European comics and grand prize winner of the city of Angoulême in 2016, he died on March 22, 2026, at the age of 88. Figure of Journal of Tintinfor a good sixty years, he notably published the series Bernard Prince et Comanchesagas that have become legendary, as well as several albums from the Signé collection, from Dupuis.

Born in Belgium in 1938, in Bévercé, a small village in the Ardennes, Hermann Huppen was a graphic designer chained to his drawing table since 1966. After an apprenticeship in cabinetmaking, the young Hermann worked in an architectural firm, before launching into comics in the mid-1960s. A world he discovered through his brother-in-law Philippe Vandooren, novelist and future editor-in-chief from the newspaper Spirou. In 1965, Hermann published his first comic strips there, a short story from the Belles histoire collection.
of Uncle Paul.

From the following year, and before working on Jugurtha he began a fruitful collaboration with a screenwriter then on the rise: Michel Greg. “I really learned my trade from Greg”said Hermann. Together, they created two major series, which were published in the pages of Journal of Tintin. Until 1980, Hermann designed fourteen albums in the saga, before giving way to Dany and Aidans, before returning for a final episode scripted by his son Yves H. and released in 2010. In the wake of Bernard Prince, Greg and Hermann will also have launched Comanchein 1969. A western noted for its realism and its nervousness, which also has the particularity of its female protagonist, in a genre and a register usually reserved for male heroes. The designer will sign no less than ten albums of Comanchebefore Michel Rouge took over. These two series
offer a more realistic and above all more adult approach to comics, at a time when they are still mainly intended for young readers. They do not hesitate to address the issue of violence head-on. Hermann then follows in the tradition of authors such as William Vance, Franz and Dany.

Spotted by Hergé

Misanthrope, rebellious by nature, skinned alive but so generous and wounded, this author has continued to evolve his graphics, as nervous as they are virtuoso. This virtuosity was noticed early by Hergé, even if he did not dare to say it directly to the person concerned. As he declared in the columns of Figaro in 2017 when he had just been elected grand prize of the city of Angoulême: “It was Michel Greg who spoke to me about it one day. Hergé had spotted one of my boards Comanche in which I represented an Indian camp, and had spoken well of it. »

At the time, Hermann was not one of the aficionados of the creator of Tintin. Nevertheless, they both happened to chat together, living in the same neighborhood of Brussels. “With Hergé, we were chatting in front of the pastry shop, he was having fun. We talked about everything except comics. He then left with his wand under his arm. I remember him as a very polite gentleman. A gentleman… He was on the verge of shyness, no doubt still a little shaken by all the trouble they had caused him during the Liberation. It must be said that there were many so-called beautiful minds who stole his feathers, even though he did nothing wrong except continue to draw children’s stories in the newspapers. I find that shameful! »

 

The ones that make me itch are the real bad guys. For me, it’s an obsession. […] I want to spit my venom. It’s visceral.

Hermann

Hermann’s indignation was on edge. Anchored at the heart of his universe, we often found this rampant cruelty that lies dormant in each of us in his albums. “For me, the little uglinesses of life perfectly punctuate a story. I have been marked by this since childhood. You know, I was born in the countryside. When I was a kid, I noticed the petty behavior of certain people. I suffered from that. For example, I remember my little neighbor who stuck pieces of pointed sticks into the toads as soon as he saw one. This made him laugh, while I was disgusted by such barbarity. Without daring to say it. The worst was when I was forced to participate. »

A prolix but somewhat harsh author, Hermann has always been an eccentric in the comics world. Everyone admires to the point of jealousy his very “physical” style and his astonishing way of capturing human beings in movement. The artist knew better than anyone how to capture these little moments of calm before the storm. One of his last albums Duke will not have been an exception to this intimate rule. In this Sergio Leone-style western, revised and corrected by Sam Peckinpah, this great admirer of Egon Schiele embroiders a dark and vengeful plot with multiple ramifications.
” It’s true, he once confessed to Le FigaroI always wanted to show humanity at its worst. Of course, sometimes you meet beautiful people. But the ones that make me itch are the real bad guys. For me, it’s an obsession. I don’t do it on purpose. I want to show them what they are. I want to spit my venom. It’s visceral. »

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As for Hermann’s unquenchable thirst for drawing, it still shines through in his abundant work, which amounts to more than 120 published albums. He himself had put forward a hypothesis concerning this permanent desire “I think it’s genetic. In fact, there is only one explanation: my mother! This woman had inexhaustible energy. I usually say that to save her children, she would have attacked a locomotive with a fork. This inner drive, all this vigor, it comes from her. » This engine has just stopped, but the work is there, and for a long time! Thank you, Mr Hermann.