Some years before, my friend Dimitris Vassilopoulos introduced me to Jean Barbaud, a key artist in the animated series Once Upon a Time, and main character designer. He had visited the annual modeller’s exhibition of IPMS-Hellas, so I had the luck to meet him there.
Some time passed since then, when I decided to ask for an interview on him, through e-mail and fortunately I received a positive reply…

Aviation Caricature by Jean Barbaud, commissioned for the research team of Greeks in Foreign Cockpits. It represents a P-47D flown by the Greek-American Spiros Karavedas in the 58th FG.  More info in the following link: https://www.greeks-in-foreign-cockpits.com/pilots-crews/fighter-pilots/spiros-karavedas/

Question:
As you might know, your work’s fame precedes your presence in Greece, something rather flattering for an artist/creator. So I thought it could please a great amount of Greeks, getting acquainted with an important member of the team of one of the most iconic cartoon series ever presented in the Greek television. And of course I am talking about the Once Upon A Time series. But before we arrive to that, Could you give us a brief presentation of your past and what you would consider as your identity?

Jean Barbaud:
I was born in 1955, in a small french town, in the Loire Valley area. I remember I have always been interested into drawing & sketching, and of course reading comics & books. I was also interested into planes, very soon, having an uncle who was a French Army Air Force pilot. He was shot down, flying a rescue helicopter when I was a kid.
I had some art lessons, when at school, but that led me to technical drawings and I had no pleasure doing these… most of my “lessons” were having a look at comics publications, which was quite easy as my grand-parents had a press & book store! I could borrow all what they let me read or have a look at.
After my graduation, around 18 years old, I opted for an “advertising art-school” in Tours, 120kms from home. I stayed there for 3 years, studying basics of anatomy, perspective, colors, pen & inks, commercial art, illustration, etc… One of my teachers was interested into comics, and even more into animated cartoons. His name: Bernard Deyries. He left school to start a cartoon studio in the same town, and offered me to work with them, after my diploma (1976)
When I first visited the art school with my father (1973), to meet the director, I saw some works hanging on the walls, in the entrance hall. Some were signed by Afroula, as she was the best student, of the year before I arrived in Tours. My former teacher hired her too, to work on backgrounds, while I was following my 3-years art course: we never met at school, but I met her at the studio. She was born in Athens, but then her family had settled in France since she was a kid. We went in Greece in 1977 for the first time together, but never lived there… except for some vacations!

Question:
What is your professional involvement in the Once upon a time series?

Jean Barbaud:
While I was in my 3rd and last year, at the art school, I spent one week at the DIC studio, and learned how to animate a short sequence, how to paint on cellulo and liked it. Before I left for the week-end, my ex-teacher said that a producer from Paris wanted to create a series of educational animated cartoons! His name was Albert Barillé, and the series would be Once Upon a Time – Man!
I knew that Bernard & his team, including Afroula, were going to submit their versions; but he said that I was welcome to give it a try, and bring him my version of the characters, next week. I spent the week-end at my parents’ home, sketching the characters described by A.Barillé and produced a handful of model-sheets before going back to Tours. This was just a test for me as I know that the other artists from the studio were much more skilled than me, the “rookie”.
About one month later, the art-school got a message from the producer & his small team: I had to go to Paris to meet him as he liked my version very much!
Some months followed, while I was reworking some details on the 8 main characters. Some changed a lot (The dwarf, Maestro) but others, not that much. My favorite is of course, Maestro: his shape is very simple and he looks to be a sort of giant furry-beard! This is really a funny character, but I also like the 2 villains, as they can have really mean expressions that other “good” characters can’t display…
I did the main model-sheets for all the characters + expressions models for them. Also did simpler models for any characters, animals, props & vehicles appearing in each of the 26 episodes. I had about 2-3 weeks on each on these stories. While I was at work, another artist painted about one dozen models of backgrounds, too. Then, a team of storyboard artists began to work on the 26 minutes story, before the producer could ship the whole package to a Japanese animation studio who would be in charge of turning all these elements into an animated cartoon.
Then, they would send a copy of the episode, back to France, so the author-producer could ad music & sound-effects and sometimes ask for “retakes” (modifications). Actors would also record the French voices of he characters, and that was fun to see!
Albert Barillé was sort of a Maestro, leading an orchestra of artists, on the score he had written.

Question:
What would you think makes Once Upon A Time series something more that just an entertainment program? Was there a vision behind this project?

Jean Barbaud:
Well, Albert Barille wanted to educate children, while entertaining them.

Question:
As we are going to publish this interview in an aviation oriented website, I couldn’t miss turning the discussion to another part of your activity…. Aviation Cartoons. How did it happen?

Jean Barbaud:
I said that my uncle was a pilot. I liked airplanes and build plastic models when I was a teenager. I also enjoyed WW2 stories, and specially books by French ace, Pierre Clostermann: my father had a couple of these books, and I loved the dynamic writing of the author. I first sketched a couple of comics stories from the above books, in a quite “realistic” style (heeheehee), they were awful, I guess, due to my poor skills) and influenced by some famous French aviation comics. Then I lost a bit of interest into aviation and began to draw super-heroes and horror stories! I had also stopped building model-kits… when a friend who would become the graphic-designer of the Once upon a time, Space spaceships, got me interested again in planes and Sci-Fi!
Being less & less interested into realistic style, I tried to cartoonize planes, in the same way as Andre Franquin was drawing caricatures of cars, ships, aircraft & all sorts of objects: that led me to draw profiles of cartoon-planes in the late seventies.

Question:
Do you have an inspiration for the way you see life? Are there famous figures or books that defined the way you think and act?

Jean Barbaud:
Well, I think that I see the world through the eyes of a …cartoonist. Many cars and objects have a personality. I also try to always keep some distance with what happens to me or my family: bad times will stop, sooner or letter, so I don’t worry too much and keep hoping for better times when unhappy things happen. I don’t really have “models” who inspire me, but keep admiring people who fight for the liberty of others, or for fraternity or equality. We need a sort of “World Government” to fight & overcome the difficulties lying ahead!

Question:
Now about Greece. Have you visited Greece and if yes, what do you like most?

Jean Barbaud:
Yes, I visited my wife’s family in Athens, many times, and we also spent quite a lot of good time on vacation here & there!
I never really felt like I could be living in Greece (apart for some weeks, on vacation) as I had to travel to Paris very often for work. Then came the fax machine and later, the internet: no need to live close to Paris. But we now had a child and our parents enjoyed seeing us quite often, while retired…
I don’t know if I would have enjoyed working in Greece, as I don’t like to spend days in an air-conditioned building… I prefer to be quietly at work, in our cool studio, with the window open on our green garden.
I love the life in the islands, and am happy to see that Greek people have begun to take care of the beautiful landscapes and stopped throwing their garbage everywhere. That was quite disturbing, in the early eighties…
Greek food is great, specially when having lunch or dinner outside, next to the sea! I also enjoy visiting archeological or aviation (very few) museums, there!

Question:
As you might already know, Greece’s dependence on France since it’s rebirth the modern State/Nation, is one of the most prominent. We literally built great part of the army-navy-airforce on French know-how and exports, and that relation was backed up by reinforcing a fraternity of the French and Greek people. Do you believe in the longevity of this fraternity?

Jean Barbaud:
I of course know that the link is strong between our 2 countries, and am happy about that. Your nation is surrounded by “not so friendly” neighbors, and needs to have a strong army to guarantee her freedom. I hope that Europe will keep helping Greece, as that defense has a huge cost for your country, I guess.

Thank you for your replies

You can visit Jean’s blogspot here:
https://jeanbarbaud.blogspot.com

Moris Georgios – 2022 – Sharing the article is allowed. Republication only after permission.