“‘Jo, ha not only. Sóc una iaia, sóc a vella, sóc a thunderstorm. Estic com estic, estic deaf, estic almost blind, estic arthritic, but he is the one who touches. Ep! Tinc ganes de viure! Tinc ganes de riure! I tinc ganes de ser feliç! ‘”. Reciting this verse written for the occasion, and facing old age and its handicaps with her endearing good humor, this Friday the illustrator Roser Capdevila (Barcelona, 1939) , the popular mother of ‘Les tres bessones’ , the Maria Rius Award for an entire career.
In an event at the Laie bookstore that organizes the award together with La Caixa d’Eines, the Award of honor was also made public for Picanyol, the creator of Ot, the Bruixot, who died last March at the age of 73, already who has remembered his widow, Rosa Maria Carballal.
Capdevila, who has been sheltered by her three daughters, on whom she was inspired for her famous ‘three bessones’, although she is no longer “active” as an illustrator because of her arthritis and her loss of vision, has explained that she is turning in his “drawn diaries”,showing one of them, the number 57. “In them I write down and draw what happens to me every day, the news, politics … but now my life is much more of a family. And despite my deafness and poor eyesight, I am Good.
But I always carry the drawing inside my head and then you make it go down the arm to the tips of the fingers and you draw it. But since I’m so ‘thundered’ it gets worse “, she is sincere without losing her smile and making the fingers ‘walk’ from his temple down to the other hand. “I am happy with my job and my family. At 82 years old, I look back and yes, I have been run over and I have had cancer, but that is behind me and it helped me to see how friends appreciate me. I cannot complain about any”.
In 2018, Capdevila published ‘La nena que voliaDibuixar’ (Angle), the illustrated memories of his childhood during the post-Franco Franco war, made when he returned to the Horta family home to take care of his sick mother. However, he does not think, he assures, to publish new titles based on the drawn diaries that he has been doing and which he says are only “personal and for the family.” “I have already ’empastifat’ the world enough,” he jokes.
Although no one will ever be able to say, according to his career, that he has stained anything: With the stories and cartoons of ‘Les tres bessones’, in which he ‘took revenge’ on a hateful childhood teacher in the character of the Avorrid Witch , has crossed the borders of 150 countries. And in parallel, remember, he has also done numerous series and works for publishers in France, Italy or Japan.
The postwar period of the mother of ‘Les tres bessones’
The Maria Rius Prize jury has recognized Capdevila’s “extensive work”, “which has constituted a large part of the visual imagination of so many generations of readers and illustration professionals through his characters”, and has highlighted his “pioneering figure in the Catalan audiovisual field dedicated to children “,” having created a school of animated illustration “, the” internationalization of its animated characters and of all its work “, widely recognized and awarded. He also recalled “his generous and intense commitment to the dissemination” of children’s illustration.
Regarding Picanyol, the jury of the Honor Prize has emphasized “his great capacity for work”, always of very high quality and “his search for a clean and clear, understandable and friendly style, in favor of a greater narrative capacity”. His most famous creation, Ot, el bruixot, has been described as “an endearing and very original character, who over time has managed to maintain his spirit of justice and sense of humor while remaining current, fresh and fun.”
They have also honored his memory for “having transmitted, as an author, his caring and kind personality to his comics and drawings, and having achieved with his work, to convey an optimistic and vital message to readers of all ages.”
The white magic of Picanyol, father of Ot, the bruixot
As an award, it reaches its fourth edition. In previous years, Maria Rius herself (present at this Friday’s delivery), Fina Rifà and Arnal Ballester were awarded .
