(Montreal, 1951) He is a self-taught artist who began his career in the 1970s, eventually becoming the artist and co-writer of the series
Michel Risque and
Red Ketchup. He soon became one of the main Quebec comic creators of his generation and a leader of the medium’s ‘rebirth’ in the effervescent period often called ‘the BDQ Spring’ working for magazines like
Quartier Latin and
BD. He also worked for the humour magazine
L’Illustré, where he created his Bill Bélisle character. He was present for a while in the daily press with the
Les Terriens comic strip. He created one of his most famous characters, Michel Risque, in the collective comic book
La Bande Dessinée Kébécoise in 1975. The series continued in the
Mainmise magazine. From 1979 to 1995, he worked for the satirical monthly magazine
Croc, where he and writer Pierre Fournier continued the Michel Risque series. When Jacques Hurtubise (Zyx) launched the
Titanic magazine in 1983, Godbout and Fournier started the
Red Ketchup series, based on a secondary character from
Michel Risque. However,
Titanic didn’t last long and
Red Ketchup, a favourite with many readers, moved over to the magazine
Croc. Over the years his work has been published in such diverse places as
L’Hydrocéphale, The Year of Comics 85-86, Safarir, and the journal
100% Paper, amongst others. These days Réal Godbout works primarily in illustration and has also produced a great deal of storyboard material for animation. Réal also created a series of educational comic strips on famous Canadian scientists for
Les Débrouillards magazine. Since 1999 he has taught comic art on the Fine Arts programme at the University of Quebec in Outaouais. To the joy of his many fans, his most famous creations,
Michel Risque and
Red Ketchup, are currently
being collected and re-released by Éditions de la Pastèque.