Maurice Tillieux

Maurice Tillieux was a master in the detective genre. He stood out for his well-conceived plots and exciting or humorous sequences, combined with moody artwork. Either written for others or illustrated by himself, Tillieux's detective stories rank as the best in the genre. He began his career way back in 1936, doing illustration work for Le Moustique. Not content with doing illustrations, he followed navigation courses in Ostende in order to travel later on. These plans were cancelled during World War II and he turned to writing detective novels. Tillieux returned to illustrating in 1944, appearing in such magazines as Le Moustique, Bimbo, Jeep, Blondine and Spirou, and he also created his first comics.

The first highlight of his career was in 1947, when he took on a long collaboration with Heroïc Albums, a magazine just started by Fernand Cheneval. There, he created among others the character of 'Félix'. The 'Félix' detective series appeared in Héroïc until 1956, when Tillieux moved over to Spirou magazine. He changed the names and looks of the main 'Félix' characters and this resulted in 'Gil Jourdan', which became the most successful comic of his career. At the same time, Tillieux produced the humorous gag series 'César', that appeared in Le Moustique and was reprinted in Spirou in the 1970s. Although mainly an artist of realistic comics in the early stages of his career, he soon found his turn in both a semi-realistic ('Gil Jourdan') and humorous ('César') way of drawing.

In 1966, Tillieux's main focus became writing scenarios for other artists. In the years that followed, he took on numerous collaborations, like with Francis, for whom he created the slapstick 'Marc Lebut et son Voisin' series. He restyled some of his old 'Félix' scenarios and used them for a new detective in the realistic genre, 'Jess Long' (artwork Arthur Piroton). Tillieux took over the writing duties on 'Tif et Tondu' from Maurice Rosy and turned the series into a true detective comic. Other collaborations include 'Natacha' (with François Walthéry), 'La Ribambelle' (with Jean Roba), 'Yoko Tsuno' (with Roger Leloup) and 'Hultrasson' (with Vittorio Leonardo). Due to the expansion of his writing activities, he handed over the artwork of 'Gil Jourdan' to Gos. A car accident abruptly ended the successful career of Maurice Tillieux in 1978.