Juan Gimenez

Born in 1943 in Mendoza, Argentina, Argentine comic artist Juan Giménez began his career as an illustrator for major Argentine publishers. He then moved to Europe in 1981 and published his first graphic novel in French: L'Étoile Noire (The Black Star) with Glénat. That same year, he collaborated on the film Heavy Metal produced in Canada, staging and creating the storyboard and concept art for the Harry Canyon sequence. Among the international awards he received are: Best Artist as voted by readers of the international magazine Comix in 1983, 84, 85, and 90; Best Cartoonist Award at the Barcelona Comic and Illustration Festival in 1984; the Yellow Kid Award at the Lucca International Comics Festival in 1990; and the Bulle d’Or in France in 1994. 

His artworks were exhibited at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris in 1997. This was followed (published by Glénat, Dargaud, Bagheera, Les Humanoïdes associés, and Albin Michel) by La Véritable Histoire de Léo Roa (The True Tales of Leo Roa), Mutante, Le Quatrième Pouvoir (The Fourth Power), Le Regard de l'Apocalypse (The Eyes of Doom), and Titania. In 1992, he collaborated with Alejandro Jodorowsky on his most famous series, which ended in 2004 after eight volumes and a special edition: La Caste des Méta-Barons (The Metabarons). It was this series in particular that established him as one of the most admired science fiction comic artists. Giménez also published collections of illustrations. In 2010, he created Moi, Dragon, and in 2011, the series La Dernière vie (The Last Life) was published by Éditions du Lombard. That same year, he began illustrating the science fiction series Segments, based on a script by Richard Malka, for Glénat. 

In 2019, the Galerie Daniel Maghen presented the very first exhibition and sale dedicated to Juan Giménez, featuring iconic artworks—covers, pages and illustrations—from La Caste des Méta-Barons and his other major successes, which had been kept by the artist himself until then and were being offered for sale for the first time. Juan Gimenez died from complications related to Covid-19.