History.

Name in brief.

The Banque Nationale de Paris S.A. (BNP) resulted from a merger of two French banks – Banque nationale pour le commerce et l'industrie (BNCI) and Comptoir national d'escompte de Paris (CNEP) – in 1966.  The Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas S.A. ("Bank of Paris and the Netherlands"), or Paribas, was formed from two investment banks based respectively in Paris and Amsterdam, in 1872. "Les Pays-Bas" ("The Low Countries") is French for the Netherlands.  In May 2000, BNP and Paribas merged to form BNP Paribas, which is thus descended from four founding banking institutions.

Heritage.

BNP (Banque Nationale de Paris).

On 7 March 1848, the French Provisional Government founded the Comptoir national d'escompte de Paris (CNEP) in response to the financial shock caused by the revolution of February 1848. The upheaval destroyed the old credit system, which was already struggling to provide sufficient capital to meet the demands of the railway boom and the resulting growth of industry. The CEP grew steadily in France and overseas, although in 1889 there was a crisis in which it was temporarily placed in receivership.  Separately, on 18 April 1932, the French government replaced Banque nationale de crédit (BNC), which failed as a result of the 1930s recession, with the new bank Banque nationale pour le commerce et l'industrie (BNCI). The former banks headquarter and staff were used to create BNCI with fresh capital of 100 million francs. The bank initially grew rapidly through absorbing a number of regional banks that got into financial trouble. After the Second World War, it continued to grow steadily. It grew its retail business in France and its commercial business overseas in the French colonial empire.  After the end of the Second World War, the French state decided to "put banks and credit to work for national reconstruction". René Pleven, then Minister of Finance, launched a massive reorganization of the banking industry. A law passed on 2 December 1945 and which went into effect on 1 January 1946 nationalized the four leading French retail banks: Banque nationale pour le commerce et l'industrie (BNCI), Comptoir national d'escompte de Paris (CNEP), Crédit Lyonnais, and Société Générale.  In 1966, the French government decided to merge Comptoir national d'escompte de Paris with Banque nationale pour le commerce et l'industrie to create one new bank called Banque Nationale de Paris (BNP).  The bank was re-privatised in 1993 under the leadership of Michel Pébereau as part of a second Chirac government's privatization policy.

Paribas (Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas).

Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas (Paribas) was established on 27 January 1872, through the merger of "Banque de Crédit et de Dépôt des Pays-Bas", which had been established in 1820 by Louis-Raphaël Bischoffsheim in Amsterdam, and "Banque de Paris", which had been founded in 1869 by a group of Parisian bankers. It went on to develop a strong investment banking business both domestically in France and overseas.  During the period 1872 to 1913, it was involved in raising funds for the French and other governments as well as big businesses through a number of bond issues. It helped the French government raise funds during the First World War and raised further capital and expanded into investments into industrial companies during the Great Depression. It stagnated and lost assets during the Second World War.  After World War II, it missed the nationalisation of the other French banks due to its status as an investment bank and managed to take advantage of that by expanding its operations overseas. It also directs its activity towards businesses and participates in the development and restructuring of French industry, including names such as Groupe Bull and Thomson-CSF.  The bank was nationalized in 1982 by the government of Pierre Mauroy under François Mitterrand as part of a law that nationalized five major industrial companies, thirty-nine registered banks, and two financial companies, Suez and Paribas. It was re-privatized in January 1987 by the Chirac government.  In the 1990s, Paribas had an active policy of acquisitions and divestiture. This included selling the Ottoman Bank to Doğuş Holding, and setting up the joint venture lending company Cetelem in Germany. It sold Crédit du Nord to Société Générale and in 1998 it merged with "Compagnie Bancaire", renaming the bank with the official name "Compagnie Financière de Paribas".

Founding of BNP Paribas.

In 1999, BNP and Société Générale fought a complex battle on the stock market, with Société Générale bidding for Paribas and BNP bidding for Société Générale and counter-bidding for Paribas. BNP's bid for Société Générale failed, while its bid for Paribas succeeded leading to a merger of BNP and Paribas one year later on 23 May 2000.  On 9 August 2007, BNP Paribas became the first major financial group to acknowledge the impact of the sub-prime crisis by closing two funds exposed to it. This day is now generally seen as the start of the credit crisis and the bank's quick reaction saved it from the fate of other large European banks such as UBS.  On 6 October 2008, BNP took over 75% of troubled bank Fortis' activities in Belgium, and 66% in Luxembourg, in exchange for the Belgian government becoming the new group's major shareholder. The sales of the Fortis shares was suspended by a court order from the Court of Appeal on Friday 12 December  On 14 December 2008, BNP announced it could lose €350 million as a victim of the Madoff fraud.  In the end of January, the Belgian government and BNP negotiated for a 75% partnership in Fortis Bank Belgium. Fortis Insurance Belgium would be reintegrated in Fortis Holding.  On 11 February, Fortis' shareholders decided that Fortis Bank Belgium and Fortis Insurance Belgium should not become property of BNP Paribas. However the acquisition was completed and BNP Paribas took 75% share holding and renamed the new subsidiary BNP Paribas Fortis. After this only Fortis Insurance International was left in Fortis Holding and this was renamed as Ageas, a business that had Insurance all over Europe and Asia. The remaining Fortis Bank Netherlands was in the hands of the Dutch Government which merged it with other ABN AMRO holdings it already owned under the name ABN AMRO.  In May 2009, BNP Paribas became the majority shareholder (65.96%) of BGL (formerly Fortis Bank Luxembourg), the State of Luxembourg retaining 34% making BNP the eurozone's largest bank by deposits held.  On 21 September, the bank's registered name was changed to BGL BNP Paribas and in February 2010, BGL BNP Paribas became the 100% owner of BNP Paribas Luxembourg. The transfer was finalised on 1 October 2010 with the incorporation of BNP Paribas Luxembourg's business in the operational platforms of BGL BNP Paribas. In 2013 BNP Paribas was awarded the Bank of the Year award by The International Financing Review ("IFR"), Thomson Reuters' leading financial industry publication. The IFR awards are a key industry benchmark and Bank of the Year is the top honour awarded.  BNP Paribas reached an agreement in December 2013 to acquire Rabobank's Polish unit BGZ Bank for around $1.4 billion. In September 2014, BNP completed the purchase of BGZ Bank for a final fee stated in the media to be $1.3 billion.  In June 2014, BNP Paribas pleaded guilty to falsifying business records and conspiracy, having violated U.S. sanctions against Cuba, Iran, and Sudan. It agreed to pay an $8.9 billion fine, the largest ever for violating U.S. sanctions at that time.

Corporate Identity.

The BNP Paribas logo since 2000 (designed by Laurent Vincent under the leadership of the Communications Director, Antoine Sire) is called the "courbe d'envol" (curve of taking flight). The stars allude to Europe and universality. The transformation of the stars into birds conveys openness, freedom, growth, and the ability to change and adapt. The shape and movement of the curve places the logo in the universe of life. The green square symbolises nature and optimism.

Business units.

In 2015, the BNP Paribas Group was organized around two business areas:  Retail Banking & Services, a global network of nearly 7,000 branches, comprising Domestic Markets and International Financial Services, and Corporate & Institutional Banking (CIB).  At the end of 2015, outstanding deposits stood at EUR700.3 billion and outstanding loans at EUR682.5 billion. The geographic breakdown of revenues was as follows: Europe (73.3%), Americas (11.8%), Asia Pacific (7.5%) and others (7.4%).

Retail banking.

Retail banking is BNP Paribas' largest business unit representing 72% of its 2015 revenues. Its operations are concentrated in Europe, especially in the group's three domestic markets of France, Italy (where it operates as Banca Nazionale del Lavoro (BNL)), and Belgium (as BNP Paribas Fortis). The group also owns an American subsidiary BancWest which operates as Bank of the West in the western United States. Previously the retail subsidiary operated First Hawaiian Bank, a position that BNP Paribas fully exited in 2019. BNP Paribas's Europe Mediterranean group also runs large retail banks in Poland, Turkey, Ukraine, and northern Africa.  BNP Paribas is the largest bank in the Eurozone by total assets and second largest by market capitalization according to "The Banker" magazine, just behind Banco Santander. It employs over 189,000 people, according to the bank as of 31 December 2015, of which 147,000 work in Europe, and maintains a presence in 75 countries.

United States.

In the United States, BNP Paribas owns BancWest, which in turn operates retail banking subsidiaries Bank of the West and previously operated First Hawaiian Bank. Bank of the West operates in 19 Western US states (where it ranks as the 7th largest foreign bank by assets), while First Hawaiian is Hawaii's leading bank with a 40% market share in deposits. Together the two banks operate 710 branches, and service 5 million clients.  The two banks were merged into BancWest in 1998, and BNP Paribas took full control of the combined entity in 2001.  The group has a strong presence on niche markets such as lending for marine and recreational vehicles, church lending, and agribusiness. In 2009 BancWest had €2.1 billion in revenues (5.2% of the total group's), and 11,200 employees (5.5% of the total group's headcount). BancWest lost €223 million in 2009 largely due to its exposure in the subprime mortgage crisis in California, Arizona, and Nevada.

Emerging markets.

In 2009, BNP Paribas reorganized its retail banking divisions renaming its "Emerging Markets" group the "Europe Mediterranean" group. This change was made because after the integration of Fortis Bank's Polish and Turkish subsidiaries, BNP Paribas's emerging market activities are now heavily concentrated in Eastern Europe and the southern half of the Mediterranean basin.  BNP Paribas is a member of the Global ATM Alliance, a joint venture of several major international banks that allows customers of the banks to use their ATM card or check card at another bank within the Global ATM Alliance with no ATM surcharges when traveling internationally. Other participating banks are Barclays (United Kingdom), Bank of America (United States), China Construction Bank (China), Deutsche Bank (Germany), Santander Serfin (Mexico), Ukrsibbank (Ukraine), Scotiabank (Canada) and Westpac (Australia and New Zealand).

Corporate and Institutional Banking.

In addition to its retail activities, BNP Paribas is also a leading global investment bank through its Corporate & Institutional Banking unit. Although present in all investment banking markets, it is recognized as a global leader in derivatives trading, structured finance, and project finance.  The firm is divided into 6 key business areas:  In 2009, BNP CIB earned €12.2 billion in revenue (30% of total group's), €4.4 billion in pre-tax income (48.9% of total group's), and 18,000 employees (9.0% of total group's headcount.)

Investment solutions.

BNP Paribas's "Investment Solutions" unit includes its asset management, custodial banking, real estate, insurance, electronic trading platform, "Personal Investors" and wealth management activities.  On 11 June 2008, BNP Paribas formally signed an agreement to purchase the Prime Brokerage Services division of Bank of America Securities. The sale was expected to be completed by the end of the 2008 third quarter.

Corporate Structure.

Board of directors.

As of 17 May 2020:

Controversies.

Antisemitic allegations.

In 2016 BNP reached a $40m settlement with a Jewish employee. The employee had been made to watch a training video. The film portrayed Adolf Hitler as the CEO of Deutsche Bank, one of BNP's competitors and the Nazi soldiers around him as Deutsche Bank executives. The video showed Hitler screaming at the soldiers. Also, his colleagues made a number of anti-semitic comments during his time at BNP Paribas.

Check processing.

In 2010 the French government's Autorité de la concurrence fined BNP and 10 other banks €384 million for colluding to charge unjustified fees on check processing, including extra fees during the transition from paper check transfer to "Exchanges Check-Image" electronic transfer. On 19 January 2011 BNP sued Russian grain trader, OOO Rosinteragroservis, and its subsidiary OAO Kubankhlebprodukt, claiming US$20 million in debts and penalties.

Sanctions violations: $8.9 billion fine.

On 30 May 2014, "The Wall Street Journal" reported that the United States Department of Justice was negotiating a possible guilty plea with BNP Paribas as well as the size of the resulting fine for violating U.S. regulations and evading US sanctions. The Justice Department sought a fine of more than US $10 billion, which was expected to be reduced to $8 or $9 billion in negotiations. BNP Paribas was said to have laundered up to US$100 billion from the sanctioned countries of Sudan, Iran, and Cuba.  On 1 July 2014, BNP Paribas pled guilty in a New York state court to falsifying business records as well as conspiracy in connection to those falsifications. It was also expected to plead guilty in federal court to violating laws against money-laundering. It agreed to pay $8.9 billion, the largest fine ever for violating U.S. sanctions, and substantially more than the previous record of $1.9 billion. BNP Paribas was also barred for one year under the plea agreement from certain US dollar-dominated transactions. The fine exceeded the bank's $6.4 billion 2013 annual income and the $1.1 billion it previously had allocated for the anticipated fine.  The bank's failure to cooperate with the multi-year investigation was given as a significant factor in the size of the fine. Additionally, BNP Paribas continued to process sanctioned transactions after the investigation began. About 30 employees left the bank as a result of the investigation. According to the FBI's New York Field Office and Chief Richard Weber of the Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) "BNPP deliberately disregarded the law and provided rogue nations, and Sudan in particular, with vital access to the global financial system, helping that country's lawless government to harbor and support terrorists and to persecute its own people. Today's sentence demonstrates that financial institutions will be punished severely but appropriately for violating sanctions laws and risking our national security interests."  After the fine was announced, BNP said it would be "just fine" and that it had "a comprehensive plan" to avoid similar violations in the future. The company's stock, which had fallen 12% since news of the investigation first leaked, rose 4% on the announcement. To comply with the transaction ban, BNP Paribas will use a third party to clear its US transactions. Standard & Poor's said it was reviewing the bank's financial standing in light of the fine and penalties for a possible downgrade.  Russian president Vladimir Putin alleged without providing any supporting evidence that the US government was using the case to punish France for selling Mistral amphibious assault ships to Russia. He said the large fine and the imposition of sanctions on the French bank were the result of US displeasure with France's decision not to stop the sale. Former European Central Bank president Jean-Claude Trichet had previously said that a large fine was neither fair nor proportionate to the violations and could disrupt the global banking system.

152 million risk management affair.

The German FAZ, FOCUS, Bloomberg and the French Les Echos newspaper published an article regarding a 152 Million EUR mistrade (erroneous trade) in which BNP Paribas Arbitrage was allegedly involved. The bank has sold securities for 326,400 EUR to the investor Armin S. but the value of the securities is 163 Million EUR according to the bank.  According to the article, the error remained unnoticed for several days. BNP has even reconfirmed the original price. However, a trade-cancellation was only possible until the next day according to prevailing erroneous trade rules.  Michael Lusk published an article regarding this case with the title ""Do banks' internal control system work?""  The lawyer of Armin S., Mario Bögelein stated in the article that a bank not recognizing an error of this magnitude should not be protected by law.  The Financial Times published an article in March 2018 about the case with the title ""BNP Paribas failed to book trades in Germany for a week"". They cite internal documents that show it did not book all trades that happened in structured products in Germany from 2 December 2015 to 9 December 2015. The Financial Times estimates that 8500 trades might have been affected. It also questions if the bank has hedged their positions if the trades have not been booked. Armin S. is cited with the words ""I don't think it's fair if on the one hand, BNP wants to rely on statutory safeguard clauses but on the other hand they ignored all control-tasks imposed by the regulators – ECB, BaFin and AMF – for a whole week"".  Armin S also filed a claim for 152m EUR in Paris because the relevant jurisdiction is still unknown.

Sponsorship.

BNP Paribas has been a major sponsor of tennis. In 1973 it became the major sponsor of the French Open, one of the four prestigious Grand Slam tournaments in the sport. In 2001 the bank began to sponsor the Davis Cup before becoming the title sponsor in 2002. In 2002 it became the sponsor of the Paris Masters, an ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournament. In 2008 it became the sponsor of the BNP Paribas Primrose Bordeaux, an ATP Challenger Tour tournament. The company's sponsorship expanded to the United States in 2009 when it became the title sponsor of the Indian Wells Masters, an ATP World Tour Masters 1000 two-week tournament in California. It also sponsored the BNP Paribas Showdown and BNP Paribas Tennis Classic exhibition tournaments held in New York City and London respectively. The Stanford Classic, since 1992, is instead directly sponsored by the Bank of the West subsidiary.

BNP Paribas S.A. is a French international banking group. It is the world's 8th largest bank by total assets, and currently operates with a presence in 72 countries. It was formed through the merger of Banque Nationale de Paris (BNP) and Paribas in 2000, but has a corporate identity stretching back to its first foundation in 1848 as a national bank. It is one of three major international French banks, along with Société Générale and Crédit Agricole. The group is listed on the first market of Euronext Paris and a component of the Euro Stoxx 50 stock market index, while it also included in the French CAC 40 index.

BNP Paribas est une banque française, la première banque française par son activité et sa rentabilité, et le groupe bancaire international, présent dans. Constituant l'un des piliers de l'industrie bancaire française, il est coté au premier marché d'Euronext Paris et fait partie de l'indice CAC 40. Au, le résultat net part du groupe s'élève à d'euros. Née en 2000 de la fusion entre la Banque nationale de Paris et Paribas, le groupe BNP Paribas est, en 2020, la marque française dont la valeur est la plus élevée. Sa valeur de marque est de d'euros en 2020.


Stockage des déchets radioactifs en couche géologique profonde

Principles and background.

Highly toxic waste that cannot be further recycled must be stored in isolation to avoid contamination of air, ground and underground water. Deep geological repository is a type of long-term storage that isolates waste in geological structures that are expected to be stable for millions of years, with a number of natural and engineered barriers. Natural barriers include a water-impermeable (e.g. clay) and gas-impermeable (e.g. salt) layers of rock above and surrounding the underground storage. Engineered barriers include bentonite clay and cement.  The International Panel on Fissile Materials has said:  It is widely accepted that spent nuclear fuel and high-level reprocessing and plutonium wastes require well-designed storage for periods ranging from tens of thousands to a million years, to minimize releases of the contained radioactivity into the environment. Safeguards are also required to ensure that neither plutonium nor highly enriched uranium is diverted to weapon use. There is general agreement that placing spent nuclear fuel in repositories hundreds of meters below the surface would be safer than indefinite storage of spent fuel on the surface. However, even a storage space hundreds of metres below the ground might not be able to withstand the pressures of one or more future glaciations with thick sheets of ice resting on top of the rock, deforming it and creating internal strains. This is being taken into consideration by agencies preparing for long-term waste repositories in Sweden, Finland, Canada and some other countries that would have to expect a renewed ice age. Natural uranium ore deposits serve as proof of concept for stability of radioactive elements in geological formations — Cigar Lake Mine for example is a natural deposit of highly concentrated uranium ore located under sandstone and quartz layer at depth of 450 m that is 1 billion years old with no radioactive leaks to the surface.  Common elements of repositories include the radioactive waste, the containers enclosing the waste, other engineered barriers or seals around the containers, the tunnels housing the containers, and the geologic makeup of the surrounding area. The ability of natural geologic barriers to isolate radioactive waste is demonstrated by the natural nuclear fission reactors at Oklo, Gabon. During their long reaction period about 5.4 tonnes of fission products as well as 1.5 tonnes of plutonium together with other transuranic elements were generated in the uranium ore body. This plutonium and the other transuranics remained immobile until the present day, a span of almost 2 billion years. This is quite remarkable in view of the fact that ground water had ready access to the deposits and they were not in a chemically inert form, such as glass.  Despite a long-standing agreement among many experts that geological disposal can be safe, technologically feasible and environmentally sound, a large part of the general public in many countries remains skeptical as result of anti-nuclear campaigns and lack of knowledge. One of the challenges facing the supporters of these efforts is to demonstrate confidently that a repository will contain wastes for so long that any releases that might take place in the future will pose no significant health or environmental risk.  Nuclear reprocessing does not eliminate the need for a repository, but reduces the volume, the long-term radiation hazard, and long-term heat dissipation capacity needed. Reprocessing does not eliminate the political and community challenges to repository siting.

Research.

Deep geologic disposal has been studied for several decades, including laboratory tests, exploratory boreholes, and the construction and operation of underground research laboratories where large-scale in-situ tests are being conducted. Major underground test facilities are listed below.

The current situation at certain sites.

The process of selecting appropriate deep final repositories is now under way in several countries with the first expected to be commissioned some time after 2010.

Australia.

There was a proposal for an international high level waste repository in Australia and Russia. However, since the proposal for a global repository in Australia (which has never produced nuclear power, and has one research reactor) was raised, domestic political objections have been loud and sustained, making such a facility in Australia unlikely.

Canada.

Giant Mine has been used as deep repository for storage of highly toxic arsenic waste in the form of powder. As of 2020 there is ongoing research to reprocess the waste into a frozen block form which is more chemically stable and prevents water contamination.

Finland.

The Onkalo site in Finland is the furthest along the road to becoming operational, with waste burial currently scheduled to begin in 2020.

Germany.

A number of repositories including potash mines in Herfa-Neurode and Zielitz have been already used for years for storage of highly toxic mercury, cyanide and arsenic waste. There is little debate in Germany regarding toxic waste in spite of the fact that unlike nuclear waste it does not lose toxicity with time.  There is a debate about the search for a final repository for radioactive waste, accompanied by protests, especially in the Gorleben village in the Wendland area, which was seen ideal for the final repository until 1990 because of its location in a remote, economically depressed corner of West Germany, next to the closed border to the former East Germany. After reunification, the village is now close to the center of the country, and is currently used for temporary storage of nuclear waste. The pit Asse II is a former salt mine in the mountain range of Asse in Lower Saxony/Germany, that was allegedly used as a research mine since 1965. Between 1967 and 1978 radioactive waste was placed in storage. Research indicated that brine contaminated with radioactive caesium-137, plutonium and strontium was leaking from the mine since 1988 but was not reported until June 2008 The repository for radioactive waste Morsleben is a deep geological repository for radioactive waste in the rock salt mine Bartensleben in Morsleben, in Saxony-Anhalt/Germany that was used from 1972–1998. Since 2003 of salt-concrete has been pumped into the pit to temporarily stabilize the upper levels.

Sweden.

Sweden is well advanced with plans for direct disposal of spent fuel, as its Parliament has decided that this is acceptably safe, using the KBS-3 technology.

UK.

The UK has been following the path towards geological disposal since the 2008 Defra White Paper, entitled "Managing Radioactive Waste Safely" (MRWS). Unlike other developed countries the UK has placed the principle of voluntarism ahead of geological suitability. When seeking local council volunteers for stage 1 of the MRWS process, only Allerdale and Copeland in Cumbria were volunteered by their councils. The same area that was previously examined and rejected in the 1990s. Stage 2 which was an initial unsuitability screening process, was carried out by British Geological Survey (BGS) in 2010. This ruled out approximately 25% of the land area based on the presence of certain minerals and aquifers. There remains some controversy about this stage following accusations that the criteria were changed between the draft and final versions of this report, bringing the Solway Plain back into consideration, however the criteria were clearly published in the 2008 Defra White Paper, entitled Managing Radioactive Waste Safely (MRWS) 2 years prior to being applied.  In June 2012, the independent geologist advising the local West Cumbria MRWS Partnership group named three rock volumes that could be potentially suitable for geological disposal of nuclear waste. These are the Mercia Mudstone Group rocks between Silloth, Abbeytown and Westnewton in North Cumbria, and the Ennerdale and Eskdale granites further south which lie within the Lake District National Park.  The decision on whether to proceed to the next stage was due to be taken in January 2013 by a group of seven councillors, forming the Executive of Allerdale and another seven from Copeland. The ten member cabinet of Cumbria County Council had a veto which would prevent the search continuing.  In January 2013, Cumbria county council used its veto power and rejected UK central government proposals to start work on a production reactor nuclear waste repository near the Lake District National Park. "For any host community, there will be a substantial community benefits package and worth hundreds of millions of pounds" said Ed Davey, Energy Secretary, but nonetheless, the local elected administrative and governing body voted 7–3 against research continuing, after hearing evidence from independent geologists that "the fractured strata of the county was impossible to entrust with such dangerous material and a hazard lasting millennia."

USA.

The Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in the United States went into service in 1999 by putting the first cubic metres of transuranic radioactive waste in a deep layer of salt near Carlsbad, New Mexico.  In 1978 The U.S. Department of Energy began studying Yucca Mountain, within the secure boundaries of the Nevada Test Site in Nye County, Nevada, to determine whether it would be suitable for a long-term geologic repository for spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste. This project faced significant opposition and suffered delays due to litigation by The Agency for Nuclear Projects for the State of Nevada (Nuclear Waste Project Office) and others. The Obama Administration rejected use of the site in the 2009 United States Federal Budget proposal, which eliminated all funding except that needed to answer inquiries from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, "while the Administration devises a new strategy toward nuclear waste disposal."  On March 5, 2009, Energy Secretary Steven Chu told a Senate hearing the Yucca Mountain site is no longer viewed as an option for storing reactor waste.  In June 2018, the Trump administration and some members of Congress again began proposing using Yucca Mountain, with senators from Nevada raising opposition.  On February 6, 2020, U.S. President Donald Trump tweeted about a potential change of policy on plans to use Yucca Mountain in Nevada as a repository for nuclear waste. Trump’s previous budgets have included funding for Yucca Mountain but, according to Nuclear Engineering International, two senior administration officials said that the latest spending blueprint will not include any money for licensing the project. On February 7, Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette echoed Trumps sentiment and stated that the US administration may investigate other types of [nuclear] storage, such as interim or temporary sites in other parts of the country.  Though no formal plan had solidified from the federal government, the private sector is moving forward with their own plans. Holtec International submitted a license application to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for an autonomous consolidated interim storage facility in southeastern New Mexico in March 2017, which the NRC expects to issue its a final environmental impact statement on by March 2021. Similarly, Interim Storage Partners is also planning to build and operate a consolidated interim storage facility in Andrews County, Texas, which the NRC plans to complete their review of in May 2021. Meanwhile, other companies have indicated that they are prepared to bid on an anticipated procurement from the DOE to design a facility for interim storage of nuclear waste.

A deep geological repository is a way of storing toxic or radioactive waste within a stable geologic environment (typically 200-1000 m deep). It entails a combination of waste form, waste package, engineered seals and geology that is suited to provide a high level of long-term isolation and containment without future maintenance. A number of mercury, cyanide and arsenic waste repositories are operating worldwide including Canada (Giant Mine) and Germany (potash mines in Herfa-Neurode and Zielitz).

Le stockage en couche géologique profonde, parfois appelé enfouissement, est envisagé pour gérer des déchets nucléaires, en complément du stockage de surface dans plusieurs pays, en particulier pour les déchets de haute et moyenne activité à vie longue. Il consiste à conditionner ces déchets puis à les placer dans une formation géologique stable en interposant des barrières naturelles et artificielles entre les déchets et l'environnement. Ce mode de gestion repose sur l'hypothèse que la rétention des déchets peut atteindre une durée suffisante pour assurer leur décroissance radioactive.


French Air Force.

Born into a wealthy family on 21 August 1914 in Paris, Mouchotte began his military service in October 1935 with the French Air Force at Istres, where he was promoted to corporal (April 1936), master corporal (March 1937), and sergeant (April 1937); he qualified as a pilot in February 1937. In January 1939, he transferred to the reserve and resumed civilian life. Recalled in September 1939, he was posted to training establishments at Salon-de-Provence and Avord as a flying instructor. Despite several requests to join a fighter squadron, he was transferred to Oran in May 1940 for a conversion course to twin-engined aircraft. After the Armistice, the pilots on the base were ordered not to escape to join the Free French and the aircraft were placed under armed guard. Despite this, Mouchotte and five comrades (including Henry Lafont) escaped in a twin-engined Caudron Goéland aircraft, only to find that the controls for the variable-pitch propellers had been disabled, making the take-off hazardous. However they did manage to land in Gibraltar and later transferred to the Free French armed trawler, "Président Houduce" and sailed to England.

In Britain.

After arriving in Britain Mouchotte trained at RAF Old Sarum and RAF Sutton Bridge on Hawker Hurricanes, before being posted to No. 615 Squadron RAF at RAF Northolt in northwest London. He carried out his first operational sortie on 11 October 1940. The squadron moved to RAF Kenley in December 1940 and in August 1941 Mouchotte participated in the shooting-down of a Junkers 88. In November 1941 he transferred to RAF Turnhouse, where the Free French No. 340 Squadron RAF was training on Spitfires; he became a flight commander in February 1942 and subsequently squadron commander of No. 65 Squadron RAF, the first RAF squadron to be commanded by a non-Commonwealth officer. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross on 1 September 1942.  Finally, he took command of No. 341 Squadron RAF ("Groupe de Chasse n° 3/2 "Alsace"") with the Biggin Hill Wing. On 15 May 1943, S/L 'Jack' Charles (611 squadron) and Mouchotte both destroyed an Fw 190 of I./JG 2, as the Biggin Hill Wing's 999th and 1,000th kill claim.  He was shot down and killed in combat with Fw 190s of JG 2 during Ramrod S.8, escorting Flying Fortresses on the first daylight raid to Blockhaus d'Éperlecques in the Pas de Calais on 27 August 1943. His body was later washed ashore on 3 September and was buried in Middelkerke, Belgium. After the War in 1949, his body was exhumed, repatriated and buried in the family tomb at Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris on 3 November after a memorial service with full military honours conducted at Les Invalides in Paris.  He had accumulated some 1,748 flying hours, including 408 operational hours flying 382 war sorties. He had claimed two aircraft destroyed (with a further one "shared"), one "probable" and one damaged.

Legacy.

After the war, his diaries and flying logs were compiled into a book by Andre Dezarrois which was published in France in 1949 as ""Les carnets de René Mouchotte, 1940-1943"" and later as ""Mes carnets : juin 1940-août 1943"". In 1956 it was translated into English by Philip John Stead and published in the United Kingdom under the title "The Mouchotte Diaries"; by the following year, eight editions had been printed. The book was reissued in France in 2000 and in the UK in 2003.  In Paris, a street "Rue du Commandant Rene Mouchotte" in the 14th Arrondissement of Paris and a nearby footbridge over the River Seine are named after him. There are two plaques in his memory at Eperlecques. A French Air Force base at Cambrai-Épinoy was named "Base Aérienne 103 "Commandant René Mouchotte"" in his honour. Cambrai Epinoy is no longer an active establishment, so the French Air Force Training Base at Cazaux was named after Commandant Mouchotte in September 2012. At the Lycée Français Charles de Gaulle in London on 18 June 2013 a vitrine by Yorkshire Air Museum was unveiled in honour of Commandant René Mouchotte & the "Forces Aériennes Françaises Libres". The RAF headquarters in Gibraltar was renamed the Mouchotte Building on the weekend of the Battle of Britain Commemorations on 14–15 September 2013.  Mouchotte was the subject of a BBC One television programme by Jan Leeming, shown in the United Kingdom on "Inside Out" on 28 January 2013 and another version filmed at Elvington in February 2013. Mouchotte's British campaign medals, including the Battle of Britain Clasp, were not presented to his family after the war and were obtained by the Yorkshire Air Museum & Allied Air Forces Memorial who presented them to his sister along with footage of her brother taken in 1943, recently discovered by the Museum shortly before she died in June 2012. Later they were officially presented to family members along with the medals of Mouchotte's friend Henry Lafont, in the British Ambassador's Residence in Paris on 13 July 2012.

Commandant René Mouchotte DFC (21 August 1914 – 27 August 1943) was a World War II pilot of the French Air Force, who escaped from Vichy French–controlled Oran to join the Free French forces. Serving with RAF Fighter Command, he rose to command a fighter wing before being shot down and killed on 27 August 1943.

René Mouchotte est un aviateur français de la Seconde Guerre mondiale, mort pour la France. C'est une figure de la France libre née le à Saint-Mandé (Seine) et qui sera abattu le au-dessus de la Manche. Officier des FAFL, il était apprécié tant de ses hommes que des Anglais pour sa grandeur d'âme et ses qualités de chef. Il sera également le premier Français à commander un squadron de la Royal Air Force, le 341 squadron de Biggin Hill.


Plot.

Astronauts Taylor, Landon and Dodge are in deep hibernation when their spaceship crashes into a lake on an unknown planet after a light-speed voyage. They discover their fourth crew mate, Stewart, dead due to a malfunction. The three abandon their ship when it starts sinking; Taylor remains on board long enough to see that the date is November 25, 3978, two thousand and six years after their departure in 1972.  The astronauts set off through a desolate wasteland and discover an oasis in the desert, ignoring eerie scarecrow-like figures around the edge. Their clothes are stolen while they take a swim. The astronauts pursue the thieves, finding their clothes torn to shreds and their supplies pillaged as the perpetrators, a group of mute primitive humans, raid a cornfield. Taylor is shot in the throat and captured by armed gorillas, along with the primitive humans. Dodge is killed and Landon rendered unconscious in the chaos. Taylor is taken to Ape City where he is saved after a blood transfusion administered by two chimpanzees: animal psychologist Zira and surgeon Galen. However, Taylor's throat injury renders him temporarily unable to speak.  Taylor is placed with one of the captive primitive humans, whom he later names Nova. He observes the enhanced society of talking apes and in a strict caste system: the gorillas serving as military forces and labourers; the orangutans overseeing the affairs of government and religion; and intellectual chimpanzees being mostly scientists and doctors. While their society is a theocracy similar to the beginnings of the human Industrial Era, the apes consider the primitive humans as vermin. Humans are hunted, either killed outright, enslaved, or used in scientific experiments. Taylor convinces Zira of his intelligence as she and her fiancé Cornelius, an archaeologist, take an interest in him. Dr. Zaius, their orangutan superior, learns of this and arranges for Taylor to be castrated. Taylor escapes and finds Dodge's stuffed corpse on display in a museum. When Taylor is recaptured, he suddenly regains his speaking abilities and much to the amazement of the onlookers, he shouts: "Take your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!"  A hearing to determine Taylor's origins is convened. Taylor mentions his two comrades, learning that Landon was subjected to a lobotomy that has rendered him catatonic and unable to speak. Believing Taylor to be of a human tribe from beyond their borders, Zaius privately threatens to castrate and lobotomize Taylor for the truth about where he came from. With help from Zira's nephew Lucius, Zira and Cornelius free Taylor and Nova and take them to the Forbidden Zone, a taboo region outside Ape City where Taylor's ship crashed that has been ruled out of bounds for centuries by ape law. While Cornelius and Zira are intent to gather proof of an earlier non-simian civilization which the former came upon a year before to be cleared of heresy, Taylor is more focused on the evolution of the ape world and to prove he is not of that world.  Arriving at the cave, Cornelius is intercepted by Zaius and his soldiers, with Taylor holding them off while threatening to shoot. Zaius agrees to enter the cave to disprove their theories and to avoid physical harm to Cornelius and Zira. Inside, Cornelius displays the remnants of a technologically advanced human society pre-dating simian history. Taylor identifies artifacts such as dentures, eyeglasses, a heart valve, and to the apes' astonishment, a talking children's doll. Zaius admits to Taylor that he always knew of the ancient human civilization. Taylor nonetheless thinks it best to search for answers, despite being warned that he may not like what he finds. Once Taylor and Nova ride off, Dr. Zaius has the gorillas lay explosives to seal off the cave and destroy the evidence while charging Zira, Cornelius and Lucius with heresy.  Taylor and Nova follow the shoreline and discover the remains of the Statue of Liberty, revealing that this "alien" planet is actually Earth long after a nuclear war. Realizing what Zaius meant earlier, Taylor falls to his knees in despair and condemns humanity for destroying the world.

Production.

Origins.

Producer Arthur P. Jacobs bought the rights for the Pierre Boulle novel before its publication in 1963. Jacobs pitched the production to many studios, but was passed over. After Jacobs made a successful debut as a producer doing "What a Way to Go!" (1964) for 20th Century Fox and begun pre-production of another movie for the studio, "Doctor Dolittle", he managed to convince Fox vice-president Richard D. Zanuck to greenlight "Planet of the Apes".  One script that came close to being made was written by "The Twilight Zone" creator Rod Serling, though it was finally rejected for a number of reasons. A prime concern was cost, as the technologically advanced ape society portrayed by Serling's script would have involved expensive sets, props, and special effects. The previously blacklisted screenwriter Michael Wilson was brought in to rewrite Serling's script and, as suggested by director Franklin J. Schaffner, the ape society was made more primitive as a way of reducing costs. Serling's stylized twist ending was retained, and became one of the most famous movie endings of all time. The exact location and state of decay of the Statue of Liberty changed over several storyboards. One version depicted the statue buried up to its nose in the middle of a jungle while another depicted the statue in pieces.  To convince the Fox Studio that a "Planet of the Apes" film could be made, the producers shot a brief test scene from a Rod Serling draft of the script, using early versions of the ape makeup, on March 8, 1966. Charlton Heston appeared as an early version of Taylor (named Thomas, as he was in the Serling-penned drafts), Edward G. Robinson appeared as Zaius, while two then-unknown Fox contract actors, James Brolin and Linda Harrison, played Cornelius and Zira. This test footage is included on several DVD releases of the film, as well as the documentary "Behind the Planet of the Apes". Linda Harrison, at the time, the girlfriend of studio chief Richard D. Zanuck, went on to play Nova in the 1968 film and its first sequel, and had a cameo in Tim Burton's "Planet of the Apes" more than 30 years later, which was also produced by Zanuck. Although Harrison often opined that the producers had always had her in mind for the role of Nova, they had, in fact, considered first Ursula Andress, then Raquel Welch, and Angelique Pettyjohn. When these three women proved unavailable or uninterested, Zanuck gave the part to Harrison. Dr. Zaius was originally to have been played by Robinson, but he backed out due to the heavy makeup and long sessions required to apply it. Robinson's final film, "Soylent Green" (1973), starred his one-time "Ten Commandments" (1956) co-star, Heston.  Michael Wilson's rewrite kept the basic structure of Serling's screenplay but rewrote all the dialogue and set the script in a more primitive society. According to associate producer Mort Abrahams an additional uncredited writer (his only recollection was that the writer's last name was Kelly) polished the script, rewrote some of the dialogue and included some of the more heavy-handed tongue-in-cheek dialogue ("I never met an ape I didn't like") which wasn't in either Serling or Wilson's drafts. According to Abraham some scenes, such as the one where the judges imitate the "See no evil, speak no evil and hear no evil" monkeys, were improvised on the set by director Franklin J. Schaffner and kept in the final film because of the audience reaction during test screenings prior to release. During filming John Chambers, who designed prosthetic make-up in the film, held training sessions at 20th Century-Fox studios, where he mentored other make-up artists of the film.

Filming.

Filming began on May 21, 1967, and ended on August 10, 1967. Most of the early scenes of a desert-like terrain were shot in northern Arizona near the Grand Canyon, the Colorado River, Lake Powell, Glen Canyon and other locations near Page, Arizona Most scenes of the ape village, interiors and exteriors, were filmed on the Fox Ranch in Malibu Creek State Park, northwest of Los Angeles, essentially the backlot of 20th Century Fox. The concluding beach scenes were filmed on a stretch of California seacoast between Malibu and Oxnard with cliffs that towered above the shore. Reaching the beach on foot was virtually impossible, so cast, crew, film equipment, and even horses had to be lowered in by helicopter.  The home movies of Roddy McDowall (on YouTube) show makeup, the Ape Village set and the beach site/set - a wooden ramp was built around the point from Westward Beach to Pirates Cove for access to the beach set. The remains of the Statue of Liberty were shot in a secluded cove on the far eastern end of Westward Beach, between Zuma Beach and Point Dume in Malibu. As noted in the documentary "Behind the Planet of the Apes", the special effect shot of the half-buried statue was achieved by seamlessly blending a matte painting with existing cliffs. The shot looking down at Taylor was done from a scaffold, angled over a 1/2-scale papier-mache model of the Statue. The actors in "Planet of the Apes" were so affected by their roles and wardrobe that, when not shooting, they automatically segregated themselves with the species they were portraying.

Taylor's spacecraft.

The spacecraft onscreen is never actually named in the film; however, for the 40th anniversary release of the Blu-ray edition of the film, in the short film created for the release titled "A Public Service Announcement from ANSA", the ship is named "Liberty 1". The ship had originally been called "Immigrant One" in an early draft of the script, and then called "Air Force One" in a test set of Topps Collectible cards, and dubbed "Icarus" by a fan; that name gained popularity among Ape fandom.

Reception.

Critical response.

"Planet of the Apes" was met with critical acclaim and is widely regarded as a classic film and one of the best films of 1968, applauded for its imagination and its commentary on a possible world gone upside down. Pauline Kael called it "one of the most entertaining science-fiction fantasies ever to come out of Hollywood." Roger Ebert of the "Chicago Sun-Times" gave the film three stars out of four and called it "much better than I expected it to be. It is quickly paced, completely entertaining, and its philosophical pretensions don't get in the way." Renata Adler of "The New York Times" wrote, "It is no good at all, but fun, at moments, to watch." Arthur D. Murphy of "Variety" called it "an amazing film." He thought the script "at times digresses into low comedy," but "the totality of the film works very well." Kevin Thomas of the "Los Angeles Times" wrote, "A triumph of artistry and imagination, it is at once a timely parable and a grand adventure on an epic scale." Richard L. Coe of "The Washington Post" called it an "amusing and unusually engrossing picture." , the film held an 88% approval rating on the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 56 reviews with an average rating of 7.6/10. The website's critical consensus reads, ""Planet of the Apes" raises thought-provoking questions about our culture without letting social commentary get in the way of the drama and action." In 2008, the film was selected by "Empire" magazine as one of "The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time".

Box office.

According to Fox records the film required $12,850,000 in rentals to break even and made $20,825,000 so made a considerable profit for the studio.

Accolades.

The film won an honorary Academy Award for John Chambers for his outstanding make-up achievement. The film was nominated for Best Costume Design (Morton Haack) and Best Original Score for a Motion Picture (not a Musical) (Jerry Goldsmith). The score is known for its avant-garde compositional techniques, as well as the use of unusual percussion instruments and extended performance techniques, as well as his 12-tone music (the violin part using all 12 chromatic notes) to give an eerie, unsettled feel to the planet, mirroring the sense of placelessness.  National Film Registry  Among the 25 Films inducted into the Library of Congress for the year 2001.

Legacy.

Original series sequels.

Writer Rod Serling was brought back to work on an outline for a sequel. Serling's outline was ultimately discarded in favor of a story by associate producer Mort Abrahams and writer Paul Dehn, which became the basis for "Beneath the Planet of the Apes". The original film series had four sequels:

In popular culture.

A parody of the film series titled "The Milking of the Planet That Went Ape" was published in "Mad Magazine". It was illustrated by Mort Drucker and written by Arnie Kogen in regular issue #157, March 1973.  The Simpsons parodied the film in the episode "A Fish Called Selma". Troy McClure (who appeared in such films as "Today We Kill, Tomorrow We Die" and "Gladys the Groovy Mule") starred in a musical version called "Stop the Planet of the Apes, I Want to Get Off".

Planet of the Apes is a 1968 American science fiction film directed by Franklin J. Schaffner. It stars Charlton Heston, Roddy McDowall, Kim Hunter, Maurice Evans, James Whitmore, James Daly and Linda Harrison. The screenplay by Michael Wilson and Rod Serling was loosely based on the 1963 French novel "La Planète des Singes" by Pierre Boulle. Jerry Goldsmith composed the groundbreaking avant-garde score. It was the first in a series of five films made between 1968 and 1973, all produced by Arthur P. Jacobs and released by 20th Century Fox.

La Planète des singes ("Planet of the Apes") est un film de science-fiction américain réalisé par Franklin Schaffner, sorti en 1968, avec Charlton Heston dans le rôle principal. Le scénario est de Rod Serling et Michael Wilson d'après le roman homonyme de Pierre Boulle. Il s'agit du premier film de la franchise "La Planète des singes".


History.

"Métal Hurlant" and early work.

In December 1974, critic and scriptwriter Jean-Pierre Dionnet, writer-artists Philippe Druillet and Mœbius, along with businessman Bernard Farkas, decided to create "Les Humanoïdes Associés" in order to publish a quarterly SF magazine. The first issue of "Métal Hurlant" was published in January 1975, with Jean-Pierre Dionnet as editor.  The magazine mainly published SF and fantasy works, but Dionnet prized diversity and published works by Chantal Montellier as well as those by Philippe Druillet. Dionnet also endeavored to publish foreign authors—the first issue showcased American artist Richard Corben, the second issue featured fellow American Vaughn Bodé, along with Brazilian Sergio Macedo, Swiss Daniel Ceppi, Dutchman Joost Swarte, etc.  As early as 1975, two graphic novels were published: "Jason Muller", by Claude Auclair, and "Rolf", by Richard Corben. An increasing number of graphic novels were published in the following years (10 in 1976, 15 in 1977, 17 in 1978, 28 in 1979, 38 in 1980, etc.). The titles were mostly by authors that featured in the magazine, such as Druillet, Mœbius ("Arzach" was published in 1976), Jacques Tardi, etc. Nevertheless, Humanoïdes also published other authors, such as Italian Hugo Pratt, as well as American classics "Conan the Barbarian", "Spirit", "Nick Fury", and British classic "Dan Dare". Humanoïdes also published a handful of risqué works, such as John Willie's erotic "Gwendoline". In 1977, Humanoïdes published their first compendium of images with H. R. Giger's "Necronomicon".  Humanoïdes' publishing enabled it to gain a considerable financial grounding, which proved to be useful when confronted with a number of management mishaps (exorbitant loan rates, high production costs, non-payment of dues, etc.). It also led to a number of landmark imprints, such as "Xanadu", which featured large-scale American comics (nine volumes between 1983 and 1985), and "Autodafé", which published comics in novel form. "Autodafé" (six volumes were published in 1982–1983) was the first manga to be distributed in French bookshops.  From 1976 to 1978, Humanoïdes published a second magazine, "", with a female focus. Its editors (Janic Guillerez, with early input from Anne Delobel) and principal contributors were almost all women. This innovative project, especially given the male-influenced milieu in which it took place, was nevertheless hampered by chronically poor sales and its adult-only material. In May 1977, "Ciné Fantastic" was published, but the magazine folded after a single issue. Several years later, Dionnet noticed an increase in the number of titles available in bookshops, and sought to increase the presence of Les Humanoïdes Associés. The magazines "Métal (hurlant) Aventure", with a focus on adventure, and "Rigolo!", with a humoristic focus, were both launched in 1983, but were only published until 1984 and 1985, respectively.  In 1977, "Métal Hurlant" gained worldwide attention when it was translated into English and distributed in North America and the Commonwealth countries under the name "Heavy Metal". "Heavy Metal" featured mainly European authors near the beginning of its publication, but increasingly relied on American authors as time went on. Nevertheless, it introduced European comics to the North American market, where artists such as Mœbius began to be noticed. By the end of the 1980s, "Heavy Metal" became completely independent from Les Humanoïdes Associés. As of 2020, it is still being published.  This mix of financial successes and failures led to a difficult situation for the publishing house. In April 1980, the company's ownership was divided between a Spanish printing company (a major creditor) and a number of private shareholders, principally people who had been associated with the beginnings of the company (such as Druillet, Mœbius, Margerin, and Gillon).

Renewal.

In 1988, the publishing house and its catalogue (including "Métal Hurlant") were purchased by 23-year old Swiss publisher/producer Fabrice Giger, who turned it into an intellectual property development company. In less than two decades, the company developed one of the most respected graphic novel/comic book catalogues in the world, featuring authors such as Moebius, Alexandro Jodorowsky, Enki Bilal, Milo Manara, and Juan Gimenez, and books from multiple genres, all intended for mature readers. The success led Giger to abandon his own original publishing house (founded in 1988 for traditional comics publications aimed at a younger public ) in 1994 after unsuccessful efforts to integrate its disparate catalogue into that of Humanoïdes, instead focussing all his energy on Humanoïdes.  A number of additional crises (including an averted 1993-1995 hostile takeover attempt by Parisian publisher Hachette, considered by Giger as Humanoïdes' darkest hour), led Humanoïdes to be put into administration, which it exited after 18 months in late 2009. Since then, the company has enjoyed renewed success with a number of new series, such as "Crusades", "La Légende des nuées écarlates", "Les Épées de verre", "Carthago", and "Le Manoir des murmures".  Humanoïdes have also tried their hand at European manga, such as "Omega" and "B.B. Project". These titles were published in the traditional manga format, but Humanoïdes has also experimented with manga-type publications in a more European style. The "Ecube" series is an example of this mixed genre, written by Iovinelli and illustrated by Dall Oglio. "Crusades", another example of this blended style, has European authors but a Chinese illustrator.

The North American and Japanese markets.

Humanoids Publishing, Inc. ("Humanoids") was founded in the United States in 1999 by Giger, eleven years after his acquisition of the French parent company, with the aim to publish French cult classics as well as recruit American talent. A number of successful French works were published, including "Bouncer", "Metabarons", "Technopriests", "The White Lama", "The Incal", and others. In 2002, Humanoids began publishing an English-language version of the new "Métal Hurlant" (not to be confused with the then still running "Heavy Metal" magazine), which would only last two years.  In January 2004, Humanoids signed an agreement with DC Comics aimed at integrating the Humanoids publications into the DC Comics catalog. This agreement enabled Humanoids to gain greater visibility on the market, while DC Comics obtained the distribution rights for the English-language versions of Humanoids' works. Certain works published since 1998 were reprinted, while new titles were also translated into English ("El Niño", "Megalex", "Basil and Victoria", etc.). However, the books were expensive and success was limited, leading DC Comics to announce the end of the agreement in April 2005.  In 2007, an agreement was signed with Image Comics to publish "Lucha Libre" in North America. In July 2008, Humanoids began a partnership with Devil's Due to publish new translations of French works. These graphic novels were published in the classic American comic book format in order to not put off American readers. New works were translated, such as "The Zombies That Ate The World" and "I Am Legion".  In 2010, Humanoids cancelled the agreement with Devil's Due and began publishing their own translated works in North America. Following its standard practice, the company chose to publish old translations as well as new European and American works. The post-2010 Humanoids editions are also released on the UK market, with the exception of a few early releases which were licensed to local publishers, such as Titan Books.  The publisher's official website states that "[s]ince 1998 Humanoids has been the only publishing house of European origin with a direct presence in the U.S., and since 2014 the only non-Japanese company publishing its graphic novels directly in Japan, under the brand ユマノイド ("Humanoido")". Reminiscent of the agreement Humanoids had made with DC Comics, recent Japanese-language books are co-released with Japanese publishing house PIE Books International.

Change of headquarters.

In 2013, Giger decided to relocate the headquarters of his publishing house from Paris to Los Angeles, which reversed the hitherto existing situation by Paris now becoming a scaled-down subsidiary of the American parent company. As stated on the company's official website, the move reflected Giger's ambitions to restructure the company into a "major audiovisual" company, by making "deals with various international and Los Angeles-based partners", which led to the creation of the Humanoids Production Division in 2015.

Graphic novels in digital format.

The 1990s saw the widescale development of IT technology being made accessible to the larger public, as well as the arrival of the Internet in the homes of individual users. Humanoïdes began investigating the feasibility of digitizing its collection. However, screen resolutions and bandwidth were too low to permit satisfactory usage. The CD-ROM format was then chosen, with Enki Bilal's "The Nikopol Trilogy" and Manara's "Gulliveriana" being published as part of the "Digital Comics" collection. Sales were disappointing, however, and comic book publishers returned the traditional paper format.  By the late 2000s, smartphones were proliferating, which presented Humanoïdes with an opportunity to make new inroads into the digitization of comics. The new media, dubbed "VideoComics", enabled smartphone users to experience comics with added soundtracks, videos, and even voice actors. A number of IT and web companies expressed interest in this new form of comics distribution, and Humanoïdes gave two of them the rights to digitally distribute their works.  The latest development in digital distribution of comics has been the widespread use of tablet computers. This technology led Humanoïdes to systematically digitize the entire contents of their catalogue, in order to provide its comic books on its website. New publications are often available online even before being released in bookshops, thanks to online streaming.  By 2015, the publisher had completed the digitizing of its entire catalogue.

Publications.

Meta-series.

"The Incal" universe.

First created by Jodorowsky and Mœbius specifically for the first "Incal" graphic novel, the universe was gradually develop in a number of series, such as "Metabarons", "Megalex", or "Technopriests".  The universe has developed to such a degree that the publishers have created a specific blog dedicated to linking the various storylines together. The Incal world currently has 35 published volumes, and Les Humanoïdes continues its development in the "Castaka" and "Final Incal".

"Lucha Libre".

Jerry Frissen's creation, "Lucha Libre" is the second important world published by Les Humanoïdes Associés. The series showcases retired, failed Mexican catchers in their urban peregrinations. First published in France in small volumes labelled "anthologies", they were later re-published in a more traditional, hardcover form.

"Sanctuaire".

"Sanctum" began with a first volume published in 2001, with Xavier Dorison as writer and Christophe Bec as illustrator. It has since become prominent in the Humanoids collection. In 2007, the series was re-imagined as "Sanctum Redux" by writers Stephane Betbeder and Riccardo Crosa, using the same storyline as the original but with manga-style illustrations. "Sanctum" differs from "The Incal", "Lucha Libre", and "Carthago" in that rather than narrating different stories taking place within the same universe, it retells the same story in different manners.

Les Humanoïdes Associés ("Humanoïdes") is a Franco-American publishing house specializing in comics and graphic novels. Founded in December 1974 by comic artists Mœbius, Jean-Pierre Dionnet, Philippe Druillet, and financial director Bernard Farkas in order to publish "Métal Hurlant", it quickly expanded to include a variety of science fiction works, featuring mature themes that were not commonplace in the Franco-Belgian comic world. Considered revolutionary in the comic book form at the time, chiefly due to its focus on the SF genre, the work found in Humanoïdes inspired many generations of authors and filmmakers.

Les Humanoïdes associés, également appelée « Les Humanos », est une maison d'édition de bandes dessinées fondée en décembre 1974 par Mœbius, Jean-Pierre Dionnet, Philippe Druillet et Bernard Farkas.


Life.

Early life.

Rubens was born in the city of Siegen to Jan Rubens and Maria Pypelincks. He was named in honour of Saint Peter and Saint Paul, because he was born on their solemnity. His father, a Calvinist, and mother fled Antwerp for Cologne in 1568, after increased religious turmoil and persecution of Protestants during the rule of the Habsburg Netherlands by the Duke of Alba. Rubens was baptised in Cologne at St Peter's Church.  Jan Rubens became the legal adviser (and lover) of Anna of Saxony, the second wife of William I of Orange, and settled at her court in Siegen in 1570, fathering her daughter Christine who was born in 1571.  Following Jan Rubens's imprisonment for the affair, Peter Paul Rubens was born in 1577. The family returned to Cologne the next year. In 1589, two years after his father's death, Rubens moved with his mother Maria Pypelincks to Antwerp, where he was raised as a Catholic.  Religion figured prominently in much of his work, and Rubens later became one of the leading voices of the Catholic Counter-Reformation style of painting (he had said "My passion comes from the heavens, not from earthly musings").

Apprenticeship.

In Antwerp, Rubens received a Renaissance humanist education, studying Latin and classical literature. By fourteen he began his artistic apprenticeship with Tobias Verhaeght. Subsequently, he studied under two of the city's leading painters of the time, the late Mannerist artists Adam van Noort and Otto van Veen. Much of his earliest training involved copying earlier artists' works, such as woodcuts by Hans Holbein the Younger and Marcantonio Raimondi's engravings after Raphael. Rubens completed his education in 1598, at which time he entered the Guild of St. Luke as an independent master.

Italy (1600–1608).

In 1600 Rubens travelled to Italy. He stopped first in Venice, where he saw paintings by Titian, Veronese, and Tintoretto, before settling in Mantua at the court of Duke Vincenzo I Gonzaga. The colouring and compositions of Veronese and Tintoretto had an immediate effect on Rubens's painting, and his later, mature style was profoundly influenced by Titian. With financial support from the Duke, Rubens travelled to Rome by way of Florence in 1601. There, he studied classical Greek and Roman art and copied works of the Italian masters. The Hellenistic sculpture "Laocoön and His Sons" was especially influential on him, as was the art of Michelangelo, Raphael, and Leonardo da Vinci. He was also influenced by the recent, highly naturalistic paintings by Caravaggio.  Rubens later made a copy of Caravaggio's "Entombment of Christ" and recommended his patron, the Duke of Mantua, to purchase "The Death of the Virgin" (Louvre). After his return to Antwerp he was instrumental in the acquisition of "The Madonna of the Rosary" (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna) for the St. Paul's Church in Antwerp. During this first stay in Rome, Rubens completed his first altarpiece commission, "St. Helena with the True Cross" for the Roman church of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme.  Rubens travelled to Spain on a diplomatic mission in 1603, delivering gifts from the Gonzagas to the court of Philip III. While there, he studied the extensive collections of Raphael and Titian that had been collected by Philip II. He also painted an equestrian portrait of the Duke of Lerma during his stay (Prado, Madrid) that demonstrates the influence of works like Titian's "" (1548; Prado, Madrid). This journey marked the first of many during his career that combined art and diplomacy.  He returned to Italy in 1604, where he remained for the next four years, first in Mantua and then in Genoa and Rome. In Genoa, Rubens painted numerous portraits, such as the "" (National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.), and the portrait of Maria di Antonio Serra Pallavicini, in a style that influenced later paintings by Anthony van Dyck, Joshua Reynolds and Thomas Gainsborough.  He also began a book illustrating the palaces in the city, which was published in 1622 as "Palazzi di Genova". From 1606 to 1608, he was mostly in Rome. During this period Rubens received, with the assistance of Cardinal Jacopo Serra (the brother of Maria Pallavicini), his most important commission to date for the High Altar of the city's most fashionable new church, Santa Maria in Vallicella also known as the Chiesa Nuova.  The subject was to be St. Gregory the Great and important local saints adoring an icon of the Virgin and Child. The first version, a single canvas (now at the Musée des Beaux-Arts, Grenoble), was immediately replaced by a second version on three slate panels that permits the actual miraculous holy image of the "Santa Maria in Vallicella" to be revealed on important feast days by a removable copper cover, also painted by the artist.  Rubens's experiences in Italy continued to influence his work. He continued to write many of his letters and correspondences in Italian, signed his name as "Pietro Paolo Rubens", and spoke longingly of returning to the peninsula—a hope that never materialized.

Antwerp (1609–1621).

Upon hearing of his mother's illness in 1608, Rubens planned his departure from Italy for Antwerp. However, she died before he arrived home. His return coincided with a period of renewed prosperity in the city with the signing of the Treaty of Antwerp in April 1609, which initiated the Twelve Years' Truce. In September 1609 Rubens was appointed as court painter by Albert VII, Archduke of Austria, and Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain, sovereigns of the Low Countries.  He received special permission to base his studio in Antwerp instead of at their court in Brussels, and to also work for other clients. He remained close to the Archduchess Isabella until her death in 1633, and was called upon not only as a painter but also as an ambassador and diplomat. Rubens further cemented his ties to the city when, on 3 October 1609, he married Isabella Brant, the daughter of a leading Antwerp citizen and humanist, Jan Brant.  In 1610 Rubens moved into a new house and studio that he designed. Now the Rubenshuis Museum, the Italian-influenced villa in the centre of Antwerp accommodated his workshop, where he and his apprentices made most of the paintings, and his personal art collection and library, both among the most extensive in Antwerp. During this time he built up a studio with numerous students and assistants. His most famous pupil was the young Anthony van Dyck, who soon became the leading Flemish portraitist and collaborated frequently with Rubens. He also often collaborated with the many specialists active in the city, including the animal painter Frans Snyders, who contributed the eagle to "Prometheus Bound" (c. 1611–12, completed by 1618), and his good friend the flower-painter Jan Brueghel the Elder.  Another house was built by Rubens to the north of Antwerp in the polder village of Doel, "Hooghuis" (1613/1643), perhaps as an investment. The "High House" was built next to the village church.  Altarpieces such as "The Raising of the Cross" (1610) and "The Descent from the Cross" (1611–1614) for the Cathedral of Our Lady were particularly important in establishing Rubens as Flanders' leading painter shortly after his return. "The Raising of the Cross", for example, demonstrates the artist's synthesis of for the Scuola Grande di San Rocco in Venice, Michelangelo's dynamic figures, and Rubens's own personal style. This painting has been held as a prime example of Baroque religious art.  Rubens used the production of prints and book title-pages, especially for his friend Balthasar Moretus, the owner of the large Plantin-Moretus publishing house, to extend his fame throughout Europe during this part of his career. In 1618, Rubens embarked upon a printmaking enterprise by soliciting an unusual triple privilege (an early form of copyright) to protect his designs in France, the Southern Netherlands, and United Provinces. He enlisted Lucas Vorsterman to engrave a number of his notable religious and mythological paintings, to which Rubens appended personal and professional dedications to noteworthy individuals in the Southern Netherlands, United Provinces, England, France, and Spain. With the exception of a few etchings, Rubens left the printmaking to specialists, who included Lucas Vorsterman, Paulus Pontius and Willem Panneels. He recruited a number of engravers trained by Christoffel Jegher, whom he carefully schooled in the more vigorous style he wanted. Rubens also designed the last significant woodcuts before the 19th-century revival in the technique.

Marie de' Medici Cycle and diplomatic missions (1621–1630).

In 1621, the Queen Mother of France, Marie de' Medici, commissioned Rubens to paint two large allegorical cycles celebrating her life and the life of her late husband, Henry IV, for the Luxembourg Palace in Paris. The Marie de' Medici cycle (now in the Louvre) was installed in 1625, and although he began work on the second series it was never completed. Marie was exiled from France in 1630 by her son, Louis XIII, and died in 1642 in the same house in Cologne where Rubens had lived as a child.  After the end of the Twelve Years' Truce in 1621, the Spanish Habsburg rulers entrusted Rubens with a number of diplomatic missions. While in Paris in 1622 to discuss the Marie de' Medici cycle, Rubens engaged in clandestine information gathering activities, which at the time was an important task of diplomats. He relied on his friendship with Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc to get information on political developments in France. Between 1627 and 1630, Rubens's diplomatic career was particularly active, and he moved between the courts of Spain and England in an attempt to bring peace between the Spanish Netherlands and the United Provinces. He also made several trips to the northern Netherlands as both an artist and a diplomat.  At the courts he sometimes encountered the attitude that courtiers should not use their hands in any art or trade, but he was also received as a gentleman by many. Rubens was raised by Philip IV of Spain to the nobility in 1624 and knighted by Charles I of England in 1630. Philip IV confirmed Rubens's status as a knight a few months later. Rubens was awarded an honorary Master of Arts degree from Cambridge University in 1629.  Rubens was in Madrid for eight months in 1628–1629. In addition to diplomatic negotiations, he executed several important works for Philip IV and private patrons. He also began a renewed study of Titian's paintings, copying numerous works including the Madrid "Fall of Man" (1628–29). During this stay, he befriended the court painter Diego Velázquez and the two planned to travel to Italy together the following year. Rubens, however, returned to Antwerp and Velázquez made the journey without him.  His stay in Antwerp was brief, and he soon travelled on to London where he remained until April 1630. An important work from this period is the "Allegory of Peace and War" (1629; National Gallery, London). It illustrates the artist's lively concern for peace, and was given to Charles I as a gift.  While Rubens's international reputation with collectors and nobility abroad continued to grow during this decade, he and his workshop also continued to paint monumental paintings for local patrons in Antwerp. The "Assumption of the Virgin Mary" (1625–6) for the Cathedral of Antwerp is one prominent example.

Last decade (1630–1640).

Rubens's last decade was spent in and around Antwerp. Major works for foreign patrons still occupied him, such as the ceiling paintings for the Banqueting House at Inigo Jones's Palace of Whitehall, but he also explored more personal artistic directions.  In 1630, four years after the death of his first wife Isabella, the 53-year-old painter married his first wife's niece, the 16-year-old Hélène Fourment. Hélène inspired the voluptuous figures in many of his paintings from the 1630s, including "" (Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna), "" and "The Judgment of Paris" (both Prado, Madrid). In the latter painting, which was made for the Spanish court, the artist's young wife was recognized by viewers in the figure of Venus. In an intimate portrait of her, "Hélène Fourment in a Fur Wrap", also known as "Het Pelsken", Rubens's wife is even partially modelled after classical sculptures of the Venus Pudica, such as the Medici Venus.  In 1635, Rubens bought an estate outside Antwerp, the Steen, where he spent much of his time. Landscapes, such as his "Château de Steen with Hunter" (National Gallery, London) and "" (Pitti Gallery, Florence), reflect the more personal nature of many of his later works. He also drew upon the Netherlandish traditions of Pieter Bruegel the Elder for inspiration in later works like "" (c. 1630; Louvre, Paris).

Death.

Rubens died from heart failure, a result of his chronic gout, on 30 May 1640. He was interred in the Saint James' Church in Antwerp. A burial chapel for the artist and his family was built in the church. Construction on the chapel started n 1642 and was completed in 1650 when Cornelis van Mildert (the son of Rubens' friend, the scupltor Johannes van Mildert) delivered the altarstone. The chapel is a marble altar portico with two columns framing the altarpiece of the painted by Rubens himself. The painting expresses the basis tenets of the Counter Reformation through the figures of the Virgin and saints. In the upper niche of the retable is a marble statue depicting the Virgin as the Mater Dolorosa whose heart is pierced by a sword, which was likely sculpted by Lucas Faydherbe, a pupil of Rubens. The remains of Rubens' second wife Helena Fourment and two of her children (one of which fathered by Rubens) were later also laid to rest in the chapel. Over the coming centuries about 80 descendants from the Rubens family were interred in the chapel.  At the request of canon van Parijs, Rubens' epitaph, which had been written in Latin by his friend Gaspar Gevartius was chiselled on the chapel floor. In the good tradition of the Renaissance, Rubens is compared in the epitaph to Apelles, the most famous painter of Greek Antiquity.

Descendants.

The artist had eight children, three with Isabella and five with Hélène; his youngest child was born eight months after his death. Many of his descendants married into important noble families of Antwerp.  Descendants by Isabella Brant:

Work.

His nudes of various biblical and mythological women are especially well-known. Painted in the Baroque tradition of depicting women as soft-bodied, passive, and highly sexualized beings, his nudes emphasize the concepts of fertility, desire, physical beauty, temptation, and virtue. Skillfully rendered, these paintings of nude women are thought by feminists to have been created to sexually appeal to his largely male audience of patrons. Additionally, Rubens was quite fond of painting full-figured women, giving rise to terms like 'Rubensian' or 'Rubenesque' (sometimes 'Rubensesque'). His large-scale cycle representing Marie de Medicis focuses on several classic female archetypes like the virgin, consort, wife, widow, and diplomatic regent. The inclusion of this iconography in his female portraits, along with his art depicting noblewomen of the day, serve to elevate his female portrait sitters to the status and importance of his male portrait sitters.  Rubens's depiction of males is equally stylized, replete with meaning, and quite the opposite of his female subjects. His male nudes represent highly athletic and large mythical or biblical men. Unlike his female nudes, most of his male nudes are depicted partially nude, with sashes, armour, or shadows shielding them from being completely unclothed. These men are twisting, reaching, bending, and grasping: all of which portrays his male subjects engaged in a great deal of physical, sometimes aggressive, action. The concepts Rubens artistically represents illustrate the male as powerful, capable, forceful and compelling. The allegorical and symbolic subjects he painted reference the classic masculine tropes of athleticism, high achievement, valour in war, and civil authority. Male archetypes readily found in Rubens's paintings include the hero, husband, father, civic leader, king, and the battle weary.  Rubens was a great admirer of Leonardo da Vinci's work. Using an engraving done 50 years after Leonardo started his project on the Battle of Anghiari, Rubens did a masterly drawing of the Battle which is now in the Louvre in Paris. "The idea that an ancient copy of a lost artwork can be as important as the original is familiar to scholars," says Salvatore Settis, archaeologist and art historian.

Workshop.

Paintings from Rubens's workshop can be divided into three categories: those he painted by himself, those he painted in part (mainly hands and faces), and copies supervised from his drawings or oil sketches. He had, as was usual at the time, a large workshop with many apprentices and students. It has not always been possible to identify who were Rubens' pupils and assistants since as a court painter Rubens was not required to register his pupils with the Antwerp Guild of Saint Luke. About 20 pupils or assistants of Rubens have been identified, with various levels of evidence to include them as such. It is also not clear from surviving records whether a particular person was a pupil or assistant in Rubens' workshop or was an artist who was an independent master collaborating on specific works with Rubens. The unknowm Jacob Moerman was registerd as his pupil while Willem Panneels and Justus van Egmont were registered in the Guild's records as Rubens' assistants. Anthony van Dyck worked in Rubens' workshop after training with Hendrick van Balen in Antwerp. Other artists linked to the Rubens' workshop as pupils, assistants or collaborators are Abraham van Diepenbeeck, Lucas Faydherbe, Lucas Franchoys the Younger, Nicolaas van der Horst, Frans Luycx, Peter van Mol, Deodat del Monte, Cornelis Schut, Erasmus Quellinus the Younger, Pieter Soutman, David Teniers the Elder, Frans Wouters, Jan Thomas van Ieperen, Theodoor van Thulden and Victor Wolfvoet (II).  He also often sub-contracted elements such as animals, landscapes or still-lifes in large compositions to specialists such as animal painters Frans Snyders and Paul de Vos, or other artists such as Jacob Jordaens. One of his most frequent collaborators was Jan Brueghel the Younger.

Lost works.

Lost works by Rubens include:

Art market.

At a Sotheby's auction on 10 July 2002, Rubens's painting "Massacre of the Innocents", rediscovered not long before, sold for £49.5 million (US$76.2 million) to Lord Thomson. At the end of 2013 this remained the record auction price for an Old Master painting. At a Christie's auction in 2012, "Portrait of a Commander" sold for £9.1 million (US$13.5 million) despite a dispute over the authenticity so that Sotheby's refused to auction it as a Rubens.

Sir Peter Paul Rubens (; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat. He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque tradition. Rubens's highly charged compositions reference erudite aspects of classical and Christian history. His unique and immensely popular Baroque style emphasized movement, colour, and sensuality, which followed the immediate, dramatic artistic style promoted in the Counter-Reformation. Rubens was a painter producing altarpieces, portraits, landscapes, and history paintings of mythological and allegorical subjects. He was also a prolific designer of cartoons for the Flemish tapestry workshops and of frontispieces for the publishers in Antwerp.

Aidé par un atelier important, Rubens produit un œuvre considérable dans des genres divers. Il accepte de peindre un grand nombre de portraits mais, « d'instinct plus porté aux grand travaux qu'aux petites curiosités » comme il l'écrivait lui-même, il prête peu d'attention aux détails, qu'il ne peint pas en profondeur et dessine de quelques traits. En effet, il va travailler à un rythme extrêmement productif, réalisant 1403 peintures selon le catalogue de Michel Jaffé. Il réalise surtout de grands projets religieux, des peintures mythologiques, et d'importantes séries de peintures historiques. Prisé des Grands pour l'érudition et le charme de sa conversation, il joue également un rôle diplomatique important à son époque et jouit d'une position sociale sans égale chez les artistes de son temps.