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Who is Philippe Caza?

An Interview with Philippe Caza Founder of Science Fiction Realism Art in France An Interview with Philippe Caza Founder of Science Fiction Realism Art in France
Philippe Caza

 

Born in 1941.

After his professional debut devoted to advertising design, Philippe Cazaumayou, known as Caza, converted around 1970 to science fiction illustration and comics.

70’s

He first published Kris Kool with Eric Losfeld (1970), a science-fiction comic strip, marked by the influences of JC Forest’s Barbarella and Guy Peellaert’s “pop-art” creations: Jodelle and Pravda.

From 71, he divided his activity between illustrations and covers for the various publications of Editions Opta (Fiction, Galaxie, Galaxie Bis, the CLA – Anticipation Book Club –, Anti-Mondes, Emmanuelle, Marginal…) and short stories in the magazine Pilote (When Costumes Had Teeth, Hysterical Tales, Le Caillou rouge).

At the birth of Métal Hurlant (74), he began to supply this magazine with science-fiction stories with mythological tendencies (Sanguine, L’Oiseau-Poussière, Arkhê…)

Around 1974, his production of illustrations directed him to Éditions J’ai Lu , for which he first illustrated the great classics of heroic fantasy : Catherine L. Moore, Abraham Merritt, Leigh Brackett, etc.

At the same time, in Pilote, he published a series of short stories entitled Scenes from suburban life , centered on acerbic satire of modern life and the intrusion of the fantastic into everyday life.

80’s

In the 80s, devoting himself definitively to science fiction, he began in Pilote the series The Shadow Age , a dark (but very colorful) chronicle of a future where humans are reduced to the state of ‘Oms , survive in closed cities while outside, appear the Others , mutants who reincarnate the creatures of our legends.

At the same time, he provided the Associated Humanoids with material for the Laïlah collection, where, once again, mythological themes are revisited through science fiction and eroticism.

He participates in several collective portfolios, illustrates Robert Escarpit for Bayard-Presse, publishes Mémoire des écumes (Show, album, film and disc, in collaboration with the photographer, filmmaker and novelist Christian Lejalé and the musician Henry Torgue), also dabbled in theatrical decor and costume for Will they eat? by Victor Hugo, ridden by the NTPM, in the Languedoc-Roussillon region. Subsequently, he will also create the sets for the ballet I’m going to stay close to you for the Michèle Ettori dance company.

From 85 to 87, he worked with René Laloux on the animated feature film Gandahar, based on the eponymous novel by JP Andrevon, as well as on a short film, Comment Wang-Fô was saved , based on the oriental story by Marguerite Yourcenar.

In illustration, he works for Editions Albin Michel (Skaith, by Leigh Brackett), as well as in the field of role-playing games (Simulacres, for Casus Belli, Call of Cthulhu, for Descartes Games), and video games. (Kult, Drakkhen, for Infogrames), while continuing to produce for J’ai Lu, to which he supplied more than 140 covers of science fiction novels, fantasy and fantasy (Isaac Asimov, PJ Farmer, Jack Vance, Robert Silverberg, Frederik Pohl, AE Van Vogt, Theodore Sturgeon, Roger Zelazny, Philip K. Dick, John Brunner, Tim Powers, Loïs McMaster Bujold, Richard Canal, David Brin, Pierre Bordage, Ayerdhal, etc.).

90’s

In the 90s, he devoted himself mainly to a long series in comics, The World of Arkadi , combining science fiction and fantasy and whose setting is our Earth which, in the distant future, has stopped rotating. This series ended in 2008 in ten albums: nine volumes + the prequel Nocturnes (Guy Delcourt).

He also scripted a series of heroic fantasy with a humorous tendency, Asbestos , drawn by Patrick Lemordan for Soleil Productions, interrupted by the publisher after 4 volumes. We will never know the end – it’s stupid!

Multimedia: Caza produced in 96-97 a large number of illustrations for the CD-ROM “Jules Verne’s Legacy”. (Financial disaster!)

2000’s

In the early 2000s, he devoted himself mainly (co-script and graphic creation) to a new feature-length cartoon , Les Enfants de larain , based on the novel by Serge Brussolo “In the image of the dragon”. (Directed by Philippe Leclerc. Music by Didier Lockwwod. Production by Belokan. Distribution MK2. Started production in September 2000. Released in February 2003. DVD available.)

Since finishing The World of Arkadi, Caza considers himself “retired”. This means that he is currently dedicated to multiplying on the net (mainly blog and Facebook) and to walking in the countryside. But he has not said his last word! Indeed, following the creation of the satirical newspaper Siné Hebdo , in 2009, he began to draw political press. Siné Hebdo, La Mèche, Zélium (all three disappeared), Psikopat , Barricade… have become, in addition to the Internet, its preferred media.

Prizes and exhibitions : He has been awarded by the Swedish Comic Strip Academy, by the comic strip festival of Hyères and that of Calais and has twice received the prize for best SF illustrator awarded by the readers of Science-Fiction Magazine. In 2007, he was awarded “for all of his work” by the Toulouse comic book festival and that of Chambéry.

“La Maison d’Ailleurs” in Yverdon, Switzerland, a European museum of science fiction, devoted a major retrospective exhibition to him in 1993. (Other exhibitions at the Utopiales in Poitiers then in Nantes, at the Galaxiales in Nancy, at the SF Days in Roanne, at the SF Conventions in Lodève and Isle-sur-la-Sorgue and in numerous comic strip festivals and various media libraries, particularly in the Champagne-Ardennes region in 2006-2007). In 2010: exhibition of very recent press cartoons in a Parisian gallery, Le Cadre d’Olivier.

2010’s

In addition to the almost daily continuation of news cartoons, and the resulting collective collections (Non de Dieux!, and the annual Almanacs of press cartoons), he participates in various collectives, mainly for fun. Similarly, he produced many drawings “for pleasure”, hence the edition by the 9th World (the bookstore La Comète de Carthage) of the small collection of “charming” drawings La Porte Rouge .

All this leading to what is happening on his online store: a new comic strip at the end of 2012 (it was itchy, anyway…), Le Jardin Délicieux , an iconoclastic rereading of the Garden of Eden episode from Genesis. As well as the digital edition of its archives and its abundance of press cartoons, not to mention a few ongoing projects.

 

 

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