Franco-Belgian comics have arguably seen the relationship between comic and automotive culture at its most productive. Here, the seeds were sewn – in the shape of Hergé’s first “Tintin” adventure of 1929 – for the development of a comic tradition which frequently blended background drawings based on aspects of real life with abstract figures from the creators’ fertile imagination. The portrayal of automobiles – trucks or roadsters, taxis or vans – is one area in which the illustrators have often given free reign to their passion for detail.

The first car in which Hergé featured his soon-to-be-famous young reporter was a Mercedes. In 1929 Georges Remi (the illustrator’s real name) sent his new hero off on a journalistic assignment to the Soviet Union. In Berlin, Tintin swaps his seat on the train for the wheel of a Mercedes, swiped from under the noses of the police. That early cheek was to become the exception rather than the rule, though, as Tintin took on an altogether more serious persona.

But it wasn’t only the character of the protagonist which experienced an about-turn, the style of Tintin’s illustrator also changed in nature. Hergé’s early work had little in common with the highly detailed and exquisitely produced comics which were to seal his fame as the founder of the “ligne claire”. Having said that, the scene of Tintin on his high-speed dash in the 1920s Mercedes 15/70/100 PS (built as the Mercedes-Benz 400 from 1926) leaves little doubt as to the identity of the car. From the pointed radiator to the Mercedes three-pointed star, not yet encircled in the ring familiar today, Hergé ignored none of the car’s hallmark details in his otherwise heavily simplified sketches. Among the other Mercedes-Benz models given center stage by the illustrator were the “Ponton”, 300, 190 SL roadster and L 319 van – a line-up brought back together for a nostalgic reunion at the “Rallye Tintin” in Brussels in July 2005. Also in attendance at the rally was a 1925 Mercedes 15/70/100 – bearing the number 1 to befit its status as the first vehicle driven by Tintin – from the Mercedes-Benz Museum’s own collection. A keen sense of history was also shown by the participants in the rally who turned up in Mercedes-Benz 190 SL roadsters with the number 11 prominently displayed on the doors, in homage to the 190 SL which Hergé included in the climax to the “Red Sea Sharks” story.

It was no more than a few years before the comparatively rough sketches of the first adventures had evolved into extremely intricate illustrations. And Hergé soon perfected this attention to detail. Indeed, the Belgian master added two revised versions of the “The Black Island”, motivated by – among other things – a desire to update the features of a fire engine. Hergé set new standards with his ability to reproduce vehicles with great accuracy and went on to provide illustrations for adverts for French automobiles later in his career.

Mercedes-Benz was among those keen to latch onto the relationship between comics and advertising. For the presentation of the Viano in the Rheingau region of Germany, Michael Apitz and Patrick Kunkel – the men behind the comic series “Karl” – created a special-edition comic starring the new model alongside their hero.