Griffo

Werner Goelen, who signs with Griffo, got his degree at the Academy of Fine Arts of Anvers in 1971. He joined the artistic group Ercola, and published his first comics in alternative publications like Spruit. From 1972 to 1974, he worked for Mimo and Extra, while also doing caricatures of rock stars in Humo. Griffo addititionally worked for Tintin, where he briefly continued the 'Modeste et Pompon' series, and did some short stories for Tintin Sélection. At the same time, he worked in the advertising field and provided erotic pages to the publishing house Biofot.

He returned to classical comics in 1982, with 'L'Ordre du Dragon Noir', an adventure of Bob Wilson written by Marcus (Danny de Laet) and published in Le Journal Illustré le Plus Grand du Monde. In 1984, he began the futuristic 'S.O.S. Bonheur' series with Jean Van Hamme in Spirou. This series was published as a trilogy in the Aire Libre collection of Dupuis in 1988 and 1989. In 1987, he worked with scriptwriter Jean-François Di Giorgio on 'Munro', a detective series set in the interbellum. Griffo illustrated three episodes, and then handed over the artistic duties to André Taymans.

Griffo eventually began a longtime collaboration with scriptwriter Jean Dufaux, starting with the series 'Béatifica Blues' at Dargaud in 1986. The sequel to this story, 'Samba Bugatti', was published by Glénat in 1992. In 1987, Griffo and Dufaux began the historical 'Giacomo C' series. In the 1990s, they made 'L'Aigle, Mademoiselle' at Glénat, as well as the 'Monsieur Noir' diptych in the Aire Libre collection of Dupuis. Griffo then teamed up with Patrick Cothias and launched the historical saga 'Cinjis Quan' at Glénat in 1996. Also with Cothias, he also made 'La Pension du Dr. Eon' in the Signé collection of the publishing house Lombard. In 2000, he began the series 'Vlad' with scripts by Yves Swolfs for the Troisième Vague collection of Lombard. Three years later, he worked with Valérie Mangin on 'Petit Miracle' at Soleil.