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Francisco Ibáñez (2017 recording)
Photo: Marta Pérez / Agencia EFE / IMAGO
The creator of the famous comic series »Clever & Smart«, Francisco Ibáñez, has died. This was announced by Penguin Random House Group Editorial on Saturday. Ibáñez was 87 years old.
Ibáñez grew up in Barcelona, where he began drawing on a white corner of his father's newspaper. He had not found any other suitable paper in his parents' house, so it is handed down.
When Ibáñez drew his first cartoon in the comic strip Chicos in 1943 at the age of seven, he received five pesetas for it, which was about the equivalent of six kilograms of wheat. Later, however, he studied accounting and worked for a bank after graduation, as his father had advised.
To his father's annoyance, Ibáñez later left the bank and made comic drawing his profession. Finally, in 1958, the »Clever & Smart« series was created. It is about two secret agents who work for the T.I.A. – a parody of the US secret service CIA. The series became extremely successful, and the characters were used for cartoons and other films. They have been translated into new languages, according to the publishing house.
"We say goodbye to the most important personality of Spanish comics," Penguin tweeted. »He leaves us the great legacy of his lucidity, his sense of humor and more than 50,000 pages of fantastic characters that have made a large number of readers happy.« Ibáñez also became known with the satirical comic »13 rue del percebe« about the neighborhood in a block of flats.
The Spanish writer Arturo Pérez-Reverte, author of the Alatriste historical novels, tweeted: "With the death of Ibáñez, almost all of us who were children in Spain mourn it."
Ibáñez and his wife Remedios Solera had two daughters. As children, you liked to read the comics of Ibáñez's competitors.
nis/Reuters