La mouette rieuse et la dictature

Ciro Tota is an Italian comic book artist living and working in France. Born in Italy, he grew up reading comics by artists like John Buscema and Jack Kirby. A self-taught artist, he came to France in the 1970s where he managed to express himself by making drawings. He landed a job with the publishing house Lug in Lyon, where he was assigned to retouch foreign comics and making cover illustrations. He also drew some stories in the series 'Blek le Roc', that was created by the Italian EsseGEsse studios, between 1977 and 1980. He was the original artist and writer of 'Photonik', a superhero that made his first appearance in Lug's Mustang comic book in 1980 and was continued in Spidey magazine until 1986. Both Delcourt and Semic France have collected the series in book format in the period 1999-2001. Tota dropped 'Photonik' after about 50 stories and then teamed up with Thierry Cailleteau to create the children's comic 'Fuzz et Fizzby' for Glénat between 1990 and 1993. In the following year, he succeeded Olivier Vatine as the artist of Cailleteau's other series, 'Aquablue', which he drew until 2002. Since 2005, he is the artist of 'Les Conquérants de Troy', a spin-off series to Scotch Arleston's 'Troy' series, for Soleil. His name is sometimes also written as Cyrus Tota. Text (c) Lambiek