Laurent de Brunhoff

Laurent de Brunhoff (; 30 August 1925 – 22 March 2024) was a French author and illustrator, known primarily for continuing the Babar the Elephant series of children's books that was created by his father, Jean de Brunhoff.

Early life Laurent de Brunhoff was born in Paris on 30 August 1925. His brothers are Mathieu and Thierry de Brunhoff. His own first Babar book, Babar et ce coquin d’Arthur (Babar’s Cousin, That Rascal Arthur), was published in 1946 when Laurent was 21.

De Brunhoff went on to publish nearly 50 more Babar books, as well as creating children's books with characters of his own invention, Bonhomme and Serafina, among others.

Personal life and death De Brunhoff was married to Marie-Claude Bloch in 1951 and together they had two children, Anne, born 1952, and Antoine, born 1954. They separated in 1985 and divorced in 1990. and lived in New York and Key West, Florida.

De Brunhoff died of a stroke in Key West on 22 March 2024, at the age of 98.

Exhibitions

There have been major exhibitions of his work and his father's work in 1981 at the Centre Culturel du Marais in Paris, in 1983-84 in the United States (Minneapolis Institute of Art, Baltimore Museum of Art and the Toledo Museum of Art, among others), in 1987 in Japan, and in 1989-90 at the National Academy of Design It celebrated the gift to the Morgan by Laurent de Brunhoff and his brothers, Mathieu and Thierry, of the manuscript of Jean de Brunhoff's first book, Histoire de Babar (The Story of Babar, 1931) and by Laurent of the manuscript of his first book, Babar et ce coquin d'Arthur (Babar's Cousin: That Rascal Arthur, 1946).

There have been smaller shows at many museums throughout the United States, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Dixon Gallery in Memphis, the Speed Art Museum in Louisville, and the Davison Art Center of Wesleyan University in Connecticut.

A show was scheduled for 2011–2012 at the Musée des Arts Decoratifs in Paris. In addition, de Brunhoff has exhibited frequently at the Mary Ryan Gallery in New York, which represents his work. The work of Jean and Laurent de Brunhoff has also been the subject of books by Anne Hildebrand, Jean and Laurent de Brunhoff: The Legacy of Babar (New York: Twayne, 1991) and by Nicholas Fox Weber, The Art of Babar (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1989).