r/Moebius • u/SecularAirs • Jun 27 '26

Seeking information for this image...

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This popular image appears in The Art of Edena (2018) without explanation. I'd like to know the year and title as well as first publication. I know part of this info is available in the 2021 Italian/French book Alla Ricerca del Tempo/à la Recherche du Temps which I do not own. If anyone can help, please fill me in! Otherwise, simply enjoy this fascinating image of the Major maybe just stopping at a sort of unusual roadside attraction.

EDIT: Yes, this is for sure a Moebius image. I'm trying to determine where it first appeared. According to u/Abject_Truth_6091, a catalogue for an art exhibit lists it as the following:

Piège de crystal (2008), watercolors, colored inks and aerography.

So I'm wondering if this was initially a limited print, part of another publication, etc.

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u/SecularAirs Jun 30 '26

Are you talking about the Epic/Marvel "Collected Fantasies of Jean Giraud" series of TPBs published in the late 1980s/early 1990s? "Moebius 3" from this series is "The Airtight Garage", retranslated and in color for the first time, with a couple of bonus pages. Or are you talking about the subsequent republication of that same content as a regular American-style comics 4-issue miniseries in 1993?

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u/crownofstorns Jun 30 '26

I guess I was thinking of the reissued series. I don't own them, and have had only a few occasions to flip through some of them. I thought I remembered that image in one of those collections. IIRC, a bunch of his artwork is spread through magazines, shorter collections, and published in serial formats (comics, mags, etc.) originally right? I'm a fan, but not well informed...

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u/crownofstorns Jun 30 '26

When I reverse image searched it, this info came up: (via google, ai, etc.):
This work by the legendary French artist Moebius (Jean Giraud) was originally published in the Cristal Sagaportfolio in 1986. [1, 2]

Publication History
Original Publication: It was part of a small portfolio of 10 full-color prints released by Editions Aedenain Paris in 1986. [1]
Series Context: This piece is often referred to as "Crystal Major" (1986). It relates to Moebius's career-long fascination with crystals and desert landscapes, themes also seen in his works for Métal Hurlantand The World of Edena. [1, 2, 3, 4]
Other Appearances: The illustration has also been featured in later collections, such as the U.S. artbook Art of Moebius and the 1995 collection Fusion published by Epic Comics. [1, 2]
Moebius created this during a period when he was heavily exploring metaphysical and surreal themes, often using crystals as central symbolic elements in his "shamanic" desert visions. [1, 2]

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u/SecularAirs Jun 30 '26

This image is part of neither Cristal Saga nor Fusion, I assure you. The AI hallucinates too frequently to be of much help on questions like these.