Kyoko 085 - Tribute To Alain Voss (You can find the picture is at the bottom of the page)

Do you know Alain Voss?

I started my comic-fandom with WaltDisney, when I was VERY young. I have seen Disney´s "Bambi", when it came out in the cinema. At the age of six I was a regular reader of Mickey Mouse magazine and then my uncle gave me TinTin for my seventh birthday - my first european comic, by Hergé. You might have seen my first attempt of drawing comics myself when I was ten. At the age of eleven (1978) I did a comicstory about a cat-furry (yes, I started early) who was a super-hero and my alter ego. Of course there was a female counterpart aswell; my first catgirl, called Susan. Then came puberty and my comics turned VERY pornographic Lots of HUGE boobs and lots of sperm on all sorts of body-parts... And during that period I found my first adult-comic on a flea-market - Number 44 of the monthly comic magazine SCHWERMETALL, the german issue of HEAVY METAL or METAL HURLANT. I bought it. And the cover has shown an illustration of some voluptuous, curvey blonde in shorts, deep-cut top and cowboyhat, riding a raging bull; but instead of his forelegs he had 50s white-wall-wheels and instead of a saddle, the girl sat on some sort of Harley Davidson Motorbike-harness. I was hooked immediately and a collector of the german issue of Metal Hurlant / Heavy Metal, until a waterpipe-burst destroyed my entire comic collection in 1991. The artist, who illustrated the cover of SCHWERMETALL #44 was Alain Voss, a french-brazilian comic artist, who has drawn comics like HEILMANN, KAR-WARS, TOBIAZE, THE DRUG TREE and many parodies on famous european comic strips. For ADRÉNALINE he received the European Album of the Year award in 1982. Also he did a short eight-pager-comic, called PINKY WARNER who´s a sexy interplanetary explorer, who happens to be quite sex-hungry... (sounds familiar? ). Yes, Alain Voss HAS been an influence. Not the only one. But perhaps a bigger influence, then I thought or realised. I was quite intrigued, when I remembered that PINKY WARNER-story recently. And I wanted it back, because I REALLY liked it and wanted to check, how much I have subconciously adapted for Kyoko. So I googled Alain Voss and you know what? He´s a fellow member of DeviantArt...

ALAIN VOSS ON DEVIANTART!!! - And he died May 13th 2011, before I could tell him, what a big influence he is and before I could say "Thank You!".

I would have loved to show him the picture I have drawn, asking for his opinion. His version is cleaner and of course he had a life-time experience in comic-drawing - I have only started seriously last year - and that is showing. Also I didn´t use a ruler or my elipse-templates, that I usually would have used for technical illustration. I didn´t want to copy his drawing, but creating my own version of his concept. So here it is: my tribute to Alain Voss. Thank you for reading.

PS: after posting this picture at DeviantArt, I got a comment by another DA-member: "really nice to see a tribute to my father, for sure he would be really happy to know that some people still love his work....thanks and continue with your work! everything comes with dedication. Arthur Voss" :)