Josep Queralt, master classes
In December 2004, a show opened at the Museum of Valls, birthplace of Josep Queralt (1910–1993), curated by Santi Barjau and Jordi Paris. It presented works produced by this pioneer for local businesses and industry, including Farmacia Muret, Porcelanas Isard, and the iron and steel manufacturer, agricultural cooperative and printing house Moncunill. In the introductory...
Shouting at the wall
Just a few months ago, the publication Crits a la paret i poemes visuals. Josep Pla-Narbona. Cartells 1947-2004, coordinated by the recently departed Professor Anna Calvera, was presented at the Barcelona Design Museum. In the files in my study, I still have the preparatory dossier in Catalan for this book, with a different working title...
Summer designs
The plaquettes were small publications, generally in the form of a notebook, which Ricard Giralt Miracle (see earlier post) sent to his clients and friends as Christmas greetings or notifications of the summer holiday period during which the pioneer closed his workshop Filograf (see earlier post). As Giralt Miracle himself stated about the plaquettes, they ‘have been the...
“Christmas” pioneers
In 1953, Producciones Editoriales del Nordeste, PEN, published in its collection Books of the Unicorn, a small text book by Joan Josep Tharrats in which he made a tour of Christmas greetings in the form of postcards, Christmas cards, keepsakes, etc. From the miniatures of the Books of Hours to illustrations by Saul Steinberg, José...
“Spain for You”, if I may say it
This special edition is published under the auspices of the Interministerial Board for the Commemoration of the XXV anniversary of the Spanish Peace and on the occasion of the exhibition “Spain 64–25 years of Peace”. Thus, this clarification on the back cover of the promotional booklet, Spain is Different [great slogan, by the way] closed, as...
Poza at Grupo 13
Juan Poza Tártalo cites how the collaboration with Federico Ribas and his admiration for the works of Rafael de Penagos and Bartolozzi gave rise to his interest in the poster. In the years that saw the poster become the showpiece of visual communication, Poza would produce more than three hundred, many winning awards in the...
Vinyl, gouache, ruling pens, Letraset… the 1960s
“But you have to see him because… he’s a very handsome man!” were the words Lola, the receptionist of the Alhambra Publishing House, blurted out to her extremely busy brother and director of the company, Pepe Zambrana. He interviewed him, of course, and set in motion a long-running relationship between the publishing house, headed by...
![Cruz Novillo “armed the Nativity” […in 1970]](https://graphicspioneers.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/Det_CN_03.jpg "Cruz Novillo “armed the Nativity” […in 1970]")
Cruz Novillo “armed the Nativity” […in 1970]
The 1960s saw a generation of designers gestate to give new and regenerated momentum to drawing in the strictest sense. In 1965 Celestino Piatti published Celestino Piatti’s Animal ABC, which contained a concept of refined illustration that set trends and represented a benchmark for numerous draughtsmen and women, with its considerable success giving rise to...
Partierra’s Book Covers
As I focused on the mysterious figure of Joaquín Pertierra I discovered the legacy of a restless graphic artist who, while faithful to his era, also looked towards the future and whose work brought more question marks to the surface as I uncovered it. An illustrator by profession and both elusive and sporadic, he developed...
Before Penguin
Edicions Proa, founded in 1928 in Badalona at a time of popular culture and athenaeums, is an exponent of the standard of Catalan publishing in the 1930s that came to the fore by way of an exhibition and the illustrated book: La propera festa del llibre serà de color taronja! Cinquanta anys del rellançament d’Edicions...
Number one seeds
For Christmas 1969 the Spanish design tandem Elías + Santamarina from Asturias created the greeting for the Grafistas del FAD. It represented a unique form of illustrating the moment of creation according to the particular style of the 28 colleagues in the Association: Baqués, Barba, Bas, Costa, Creus, Cruspinera, Domenech, Dorado, Escutia, García Benavides, García...
Ramón Calderón from London to Santander
One of the attractive elements of running a blog on the characteristics of “Graphic Pioneers” is coming across a significant graphic work of which I was completly unaware. Thanks to the great help of Mario Crespo López to whom I’m sincerely grateful for the graphic images that are presented in this post, I´ve had the...