It always surprises me how few people outside of Europe have heard of Swiss cartoonist Zep. His most well known work by far is Titeuf, a page from which is shown above. I would say that it’s probably behind only Asterix and Tintin in terms of name recognition among the general public in French-speaking Europe – quite popular indeed. While ostensibly a children’s comic, the humor in Titeuf can be fairly adult by American standards. The punchline in the page here, for instance, is that the titular Titeuf (the blonde with the wacky hair) and friends are “playing AIDS.” Heh…stuff like that probably explains why no American publisher has tried their hand at bringing the comic to the US. Still, Zep has a great line that is both energetic and minimalist, very much in the tradition of European greats like Jije or Andre Franquin, but with a great infusion of modern sensibilities. I would love to see him become a little more well known outside of Europe.