THE PERMANENT EXHIBITION
The Permanent Exhibition proposes a tour that ranges from the first publication positioned entirely in the field of graphic narrative (The Monigoty, 1897) to the headlines or characters from the most recent era. Without forgetting the first revelations of the medium in children’s and satirical magazines that date back to the middle of the 19th century.
A discourse that began around 1865, in the first manifestations of the medium, recounting its graphic and conceptual evolution, its definitive expansion in the mid-20th century, with a turning point in the 1980s, when the Cartoon began. comes of age and decidedly enters the adult target.
1500 pieces between period printed publications and original work. A dual look that allows the visitor to observe in detail the original work of countless authors, as well as assess nuances and differences between the final art from the author’s pen and the printed comic.
Satirical Magazines – Weekly – Confessional Publications – Adventure Comics – Postwar Magazines – Women’s Comics, etc., always maintaining a segmented and cyclical order.
The choice of headlines provides the visitor with a precise reading about the origin and evolution of the medium, its different stages, the formats and targets, the most prominent creators –and others who were not so prominent–, trends and sectoral habits, etc.
THE CURRENT TEMPORARY EXHIBITIONS
Disney Comics
From December 20, 2022 to May 28, 2023
Walt Disney created Walt Disney Studio in 1923, a production company for animated short films and feature films in which they gave life to characters such as Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Goofy or Pluto. Under the name of the Walt Disney Company, today it continues to produce movies and series that have made history.
In 1930 the first comic version of its characters was published and they arrived in Spain in 1934. The exhibition “Los tebeos de Disney” takes a tour of Disney publications from then to the present.
Comics in the Belgian passport
From May 2 to August 27, 2023
Any anniversary is a good time to remember and vindicate the figure of four of our best cartoonists. The centenary of their birth, for example, although in reality it is their 101th anniversary. This is the case of Guillem Cifré, one of the pillars of the Bruguera School, a cartoonist with lively, intense graphics, who only deserves to be part of our comic book history because of series like El repórter Tribulete, Cucufato Pi or Don Tele. Or Alfons Figueras, who with his very personal style gave life to many characters, among which we can highlight Loony, Aspirino and Colodión or the last hero, Topolino.
And Àngel Puigmiquel, great as a cartoonist and as an animator, who bequeathed to us one of the most important series of Spanish comics, Pepe Carter y Coco, published in the forgotten but excellent magazine that was Chicos. And, of course, of Martz-Schmidt, a chameleon cartoonist with a brilliant, vivid line, author of series like El doctor Cataplasma or El profesor Tragacanto y su clase, que es de espanto, and also works like La pandilla Cu-Cux-Plaf or Doña Urraca en el castillo Nosferatu.
Discover their careers and enjoy their originals and their comics in this exhibition. They will help you remember why they are part of our cultural heritage.
PAST TEMPORARY EXHIBITIONS
Exhibition dedicated to one of the most recognized and popular cartoonists of all time: the great Francisco Ibáñez. It is a tribute exhibition to the creator of such iconic series as Mortadelo y Filemón, 13 rue del Percebe, El botón Sacarino, Rompetechos or Pepe Gotera y Otilio, among others.
It consists of:
-Five panels with reproduced texts and images that explain the professional career of the Barcelona author.
-Showcases, in which the visitor can enjoy a wide selection of the publications in which Francisco Ibáñez’s firm appeared, from its inception in 1952 to 2019. Other showcases show examples of the diverse merchandising generated by the author’s series.
-In total, the exhibition shows about 150 objects, including magazines, books and promotional objects. The best way for the visitor to learn about the enormous production of Ibáñez and his evolution as an author.
-Special mention deserves the wide representation of original drawings. A total of 30 plates, among which an early self-portrait, character studies and various covers and comic pages starring most of its great characters: Kokolo, Curiosities and rarities from around the world, The Three Mosquitoes, stand out. Mortadelo and Filemón, Rompetechos, Don Pedrito, Doña Pura and Doña Pera, Pepsi Man, Doctor Esparadrapo and his assistant Gazapo, etc.
Vicente Roso (1920/1996), painter, illustrator and author of countless comic book characters, including the unforgettable Florita (1947), was also one of the great creators of Christmas gingels.
The sample includes more than 50 original creations of the author, most of them in color. The art of Vicente Roso achieved international prestige in this field, a popularity that in the 1970s led him to be designated by The American Academy of Art as the best illustrator in the world of realistic “Christmas cards”.
Exhibition curated by Marika Vila. A journey through the body in the comics of our authors. The emergence of a new subject of the plural feminine in the dialogue established with the different generations of authors and its context suggests a journey, body to body, to discover the panoramic discourse of women when they recover their own voice.
Through the creation of more than 40 authors, the exhibition stresses the importance of the contrast in the forms that the icon of the female body adopts when it is represented by the imposition of the patriarchal gender discourse, making stereotypes dialogue with other bodies that they become present when the canonical discourse is expelled and the manifestation of each author’s own representation really appears… hand in hand with their discourses we will travel through the body and its variations in female self-representation in comics.
Classic Spanish comics are brimming with great names in the graphic section, virtuosos of the brush who gave comics a vocation that seemed to emanate from the very bowels.
One of them, perhaps the greatest, at least in popular significance, was undoubtedly Manuel Gago García, father of characters such as The Masked Warrior, The Stone Man, The Masked Swordsman or The Little Fighter, among others.
The author with the greatest and fastest evolution of those who met in the post-war comics sector. In just one year he went from being a dubious candidate, to exuding firmness and personality, creating his own admirable differential style. A narrator with a sequential rhythm that hooked the reader from the first panel. Also as a cover artist he was sublime. Pure adventurous essence.
A tribute exhibition that alternates printed work of practically all of his creations with a varied representation of original drawings of many of his characters for publishers such as Toray, Valenciana and Maga.
Sample of originals of the graphic novel by Ernest Sala based on the work of Dolores Redondo.
The Baztán trilogy is made up of the books The Invisible Guardian, Legacy in the Bones and Offering to the Storm. All of them have been brought to the big screen and can currently be seen on Netflix.
The three novels are shown as they are in the comic format, with very important documentation work by the author to show us images of Elizondo, like postcards seen under his stroke. The river is very present in history, as in the lives of the inhabitants of the area. The houses with arcades, like the bridges, all made of stone from the Atlantic Pyrenees. The scenes that take place among the vegetation also reach a very immersive level of detail that we lose in closed spaces created by humans. In general, the drawing is very remarkable and manages, in the most impressive and somber vignettes, to give great depth and dramatic charge to what we visualize.
The Pulgarcito magazine was one of the longest-lived in the history of Spanish comics, remaining in the memory of many generations. Some of the most outstanding autochthonous comic strip cartoonists published in its pages and the most popular Spanish humor comic characters of all time were born.
2021 marks the 100th anniversary of its appearance. Tom Thumb was born in 1921 in a growing market of children’s publications, surviving until 1939. In December 1946, published by Editorial Bruguera, it would begin its most remembered stage, finished in 1981. At the same time, the epigraph Tom Thumb also appeared in other magazines which were edited between 1949 and 1987.
We will talk about all this in the exhibition 100 years of Pulgarcito. We will talk about its history, its authors, its characters, we will be able to enjoy its covers, pages of its main series, some originals by its creators. Among its authors, it is worth mentioning among many others: Cifré, Conti, Escobar, Eugenio Giner, Ibáñez, Iranzo, Jorge, Martz Schmidt, Nadal, Peñarroya, Raf, Segura or Vázquez.
Tribulete, Inspector Dan, the Pepe family, Carpanta, Don Pío, Zipi and Zape, Doña Urraca, the sisters Gilda, Carioco, Pascual, Doctor Poultice, Rigoberto Picaporte, Mortadelo and Filemón and Olegario, among others, await you in this heartfelt but passionate homage to Thumb.
Exhibition-tribute to the main superheroes through a collection of original drawings by the best current cartoonists in our country, who succeed in the USA drawing for Marvel and DC, as well as a sample of the history of heroes and superheroes of Spanish comics.
The origins of superheroes go back to the first decades of the 20th century with the entry, in serialized novels and serials, of characters with enigmatic identities and superhuman or magical powers, and which later coincided with science fiction. Although in the beginning some of these heroes did not have supernatural powers, the general perception is inclined to classify them as superheroes, as would be the case of The Phantom (The masked man) or Batman. At first, the success of the story could be understood as an evasion of the immovable daily reality to later become a fantastic genre in which there are no limits. With the new advances in physical sciences and technology, between the late twenties and early thirties and mainly in the United States, a science-fiction genre based on space travel was created. Thus, Buck Rogers appeared in 1928, Brick Bradford in 1933 and Flash Gordon in 1934. Starting in 1938, with Superman, an era of comic book superheroes began that continues to this day with a loyalty on the part of its readers that very few genres have achieved.
The magazine appeared in Spanish newsstands on May 27, 1977. It was born with the vocation of being “a Thumb for adults” – as commissioned by its first editor, José Ilario – adding satirical drawings of the present time and fixed costumbrist characters. Almost 45 years later it seems that the formula was not wrong. In this exhibition we can contemplate a small sample of some characters who made history in the magazine.
The magazine appeared in Spanish newsstands on May 27, 1977. It was born with the vocation of being “a Thumb for adults” – as commissioned by its first editor, José Ilario – adding satirical drawings of the present time and fixed costumbrist characters. Almost 45 years later it seems that the formula was not wrong. In this exhibition we can contemplate a small sample of some characters who made history in the magazine.
Making a weekly magazine is still an industrial process that requires always working in a hurry, with fixed deadlines, with no room to indulge in artistic creation. Despite this, drawings of the highest level were always published in El Jueves, even when the reproduction (80s) did not reflect the quality of the original drawing. Here you can see a small selection of these samples of popular art.
In addition, on the 25th anniversary of his death, we want to pay a special tribute to Gin, who was the magazine’s artistic director (1981-1995) and a prominent contributor as a cartoonist and cover artist in the 1980s and 1990s. This exhibition is organized by the Foundation that bears his name and was established in 1997 to keep his memory and to promote what he has always been passionate about: graphic humor.
An expository discourse that tries to highlight the importance of the post-war comic in the dissemination of the universal adventurous novel among the youngest. The purely literary nature of the adventure novel in its origin certainly conditioned, and for a long time, a greater penetration of this type of stories among the youngest readers.
His arrival in comics made it easier for thousands of children to delve into reading them, a vision that prefigured the features of its protagonists, a human physique to walk through with their thoughts, the work of authors such as Antoni Bernal, Jesús Blasco, Jaume Juez, Vintró, Víctor Aguado, Francisco Batet, among others.
Covers and cartoons that further popularized the names of an unforgettable repertoire of writers: Walter Scott, Jules Verne, Fenimore Cooper, Daniel Defoe, Louis Stevenson, Jack London, Mark Twain, Rudyard Kipling, Emilio Salgari, Alexandre Dumas, etc.
The exhibition The Art of Dragon Ball aims to explore the origins of one of the most famous manga of all time, a work that is part of the collective memory of those young people of the 90s (now adults) and that has almost become in popular culture in our country. The exhibition has two different blocks, the manga and the anime. Every legend has an origin. In this case, the origin dates back to 1984, in distant Japan, and with a young man named Akira Toriyama as the protagonist.
In the manga part we will talk about the beginnings of the author, the inspiration helped to forge the story, its publication in the legendary Shonen Jump weekly magazine in Japan and its impact on our society. All this supported by material imported directly from Japan, such as Shonen Jumps magazines from the 80s and 90s (with large covers), replicas of manga pages or the first editions that arrived in Spain in 1992 by Planeta DeAgostini.
The anime block has a clear didactic focus and aims to answer the following question. How was the Dragon Ball cartoon series made? Through sketches, storyboards, celluloids and other original and imported material, we will delve into how the production of the animated series was, step by step.
The Belgian passport has had a facelift and invites the holder on a journey with world-famous Belgian comic book characters. The drawings not only offer the possibility of integrating multiple security elements into the passport, but are also a showcase for the world-renowned Belgian ninth art. The characters that appear in the passports are Tintin, Natacha, Le Marsupilami, Bob et Bobette, Boule et Bill, Carl Fleur, Blake & Mortimer, the Hammers, Lucky Luke, the Smurfs, Spirou et Fantasio, Gil et Jo, Largo Winch and Nero. This traveling exhibition on comics is a concept of the Belgian Federal Public Service for Foreign Affairs and has previously visited the cities of Tenerife and Madrid.
Belgium is known throughout the world for its famous cities and monuments, its landscapes and its cultural traditions. The country enjoys a particular prestige for its comics, which have the same pull among children as among adults. As a “ninth art” country with a constellation of comic book publishers, illustrators and screenwriters, Belgium has served as a muse for many of its authors.
Through their work, several generations of writers and illustrators – Franquin, Didier Comès, Tibet, Servais, Merho, Marc Sleen, Olivier Shrauven or Brecht Evens – have paid homage to their country of origin, each claiming part of their heritage. Flanders, Wallonia and Brussels are co-stars in original stories full of colorful images.
The romantic Bruges, Malines and its cathedral, the Ardennes and the cities of Binche or Charleroi are all embodied in beautiful drawings by extremely talented authors. Brussels, the proud multicultural capital shines in all its grandeur with the Atomium, the Grand Place, the imposing Palace of Justice and the European Parliament building. The examples in the exhibition ” A tour around Belgium in comic” reflect the dynamism of Belgian authors and the evolution of a constantly changing art. From the original classic albums to more recent releases, you can appreciate the diversity of eras and genres and also the richness of each of the three regions.
La romantique Bruges, Malines et sa cathédrale, les Ardennes et les villes de Binche ou Charleroi s’incarnent dans de beaux dessins d’auteurs extrêmement talentueux. Bruxelles, la fière capitale multiculturelle brille dans toute sa splendeur avec l’Atomium, la Grand Place, l’imposant Palais de Justice et le bâtiment du Parlement européen. Les exemples de l’exposition “Le tour de la Belgique dans la bande dessinée” témoignent du dynamisme des auteurs belges et de l’évolution d’un art en constante mutation. Des albums classiques originaux aux sorties plus récentes, vous pourrez apprécier la diversité des époques et des genres mais aussi la richesse de chacune des trois régions.
