Possibly the most influential character in Spanish comics, Francisco Ibáñez died this Saturday at the age of 87, according to his Penguin Random House editorial. Creator of Mortadelo et Filemón, El botón Sacarino, Rompetechos, Pepe Gotera and Otilio y 13, rue del Percebe, he had started his career in 1957 and joined the Bruguera publishing house’s legendary portfolio of authors, where he would remain for more than two decades. “He leaves us with a tremendous legacy of clarity, a sense of humor and more than 50,000 pages of unforgettable characters that have made happy large numbers of readers,” said the editor.
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Francisco Ibáñez Talavera was born in Barcelona in 1936 into a middle-class family. When he was just 11, he sent a drawing to the children’s magazine Chicos. It was his first publication and for it they paid him a duro (five pesetas), “a fortune at the time,” he recalled in 2018. Ten years later, he proposed to the Bruguera publishing house a series of adventures involving two unique and chaotic detectives. It was 1958 and so Mortadelo y Filemón was born. The beginning of the legend is reflected in the more than 30 million copies sold.
In his youth he studied accounting, banking and commercial skills, which enabled him to work as a bellhop at Banco Español de Crédito in 1950. A job that he combined with his true vocation, for which he collaborated with magazines such as Chicolino, El Barbas or Liliput, as well as in Editorial Marco’s two humor publications: La Risa e Hipo, Monito and Fifí.
Francisco Ibáñez, photographed in Madrid in 1978. Gianni Ferrari (Getty Images)
The cartoonist hugged the characters Mortadelo and Filemón.EFE in 1998
The creator, possibly the most influential figure in Spanish comics, signed copies of a comic at the 1999 Madrid Book Fair.Miguel Gener
Francisco Ibáñez holds copies of Mortadelo y Filemón in Barcelona in 2001. Consuelo Bautista
The cartoonist, along with his most popular characters, Mortadelo and Filemón, in Barcelona in 2002. Antonio Espejo
Caricaturist Francisco Ibáñez photographed at his desk in his home in Barcelona in 2009. Marcel·lí Sàenz
Francisco Ibáñez, with a group of school children in a library in Valencia in 2008. JORDI VICENT
The cartoonist, photographed in Madrid in 2007. Gorka Lejarcegi
A girl was waiting for Francisco Ibáñez to autograph a rompetechos comic at the 2011 Bilbao Laughter Festival. Santo Cirilo
Francisco Ibáñez celebrated his 75th birthday in Barcelona in 2011.Marcel·lí Sàenz
The cartoonist with the book “El tesorero” by Mortadelo and Filemón, 2015 in Madrid. Joan Sanchez
The caricaturist Francisco Ibáñez made caricatures with all his characters.
In 1957, Ibáñez’s income as a draftsman exceeded what he received from the bank, so he decided to devote himself entirely to what he liked best. A year later Mortadelo and Filemón arrived, a couple of detectives whose adventures were published in Pulgarcito magazine. Between 1963 and 1966 he created El botón Sacarino, Rompetechos and Pepe Gotera y Otilio.
In 1969, Big Thumb Magazine was born, and with it stories that had previously only taken a page or two grew into long episodes. The first of these was El sulfate atómico, which Bruguera used to create her Olé collection. Success made him worthy of the Golden Ring in 1969, 1974, 1975 and 1976.
Bruguera used the detective couple with magazines such as Mortadelo (1970), Super Mortadelo (1972), Mortadelo Gigante (1974) or Mortadelo Especial (1975), and Ibáñez was forced to work exclusively on the duo’s stories to reach 40 weekly pages required of him. This situation lasted until 1985, when the screenwriter left the publisher that retained the rights to Mortadelo y Filemón to collaborate with Editorial Grijalbo.
Francisco Ibáñez, in Barcelona in 2002. Antonio Espejo
Bruguera announced its closure in 1988 and became part of Ediciones B, which acquired Bruguera’s publishing fund, including the rights to Mortadelo and Filemón, whose stories Ibáñez was able to revisit for six years with a renewed style, dealing with the reality of the moment, albums per Year.
Ibáñez has sold more than 100 million copies, including in Portugal, France, Germany, Greece, Sweden, Denmark, Italy and Brazil. His work has been adapted several times for film and television. He received the Grand Prize at the Barcelona International Comic Fair (1994), the Gold Medal for Merit in Fine Arts in 2001, the Bear Lifetime Achievement Award at the Madrid International Comic Fair (2002) and a tribute to comedians such as Joaquín Reyes, Carlos Areces, Eva Hache, Ana Merino or Tomás Fernando Flores gave him a fee on the occasion of Mortadelo y Filemón’s 60th birthday.
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