Andre Francois

By LatAm ARTE

André François (November 9, 1915 – April 11, 2005) He was born into a Hungarian family in Temesvár, Austria, Hungary (now Timișoara, Romania). He studied at the Budapest Academy of Fine Arts from 1932 to 1933. He moved to Paris in 1934 and entered the studio of the famous caricaturist Adolphe Cassandre from 1935 to 1936. Later, he became a French citizen in 1939. He worked as a painter, sculptor, and graphic designer, but is best remembered for his cartoons, whose subtle humor and sweeping influence can be compared to that of Saul Steinberg. François initially worked for French left-wing newspapers such as "Le Nouvel Observateur" and illustrated books by authors such as Jacques Prévert, but little by little he reached a wider audience, publishing in major magazines in the United Kingdom such as "Punch" and in the United States as The New Yorker. He also did a masterpiece cover illustration for the 1965 UK Penguin paperback edition of Lord of the Flies. He became a close friend and collaborator of Ronald Searle and was a member of the Alliance Graphique Internationale. He died at his home in Grisy-les-Plâtres, in the Val-d'Oise department.