Winners and nominees of the Comic Barcelona Awards 2023

Over the weekend March 31 to April 2, the winners of the 2023 Comic Barcelona Awards were declared at the festival’s 41st annual gathering.

The Comic Barcelona Awards are prestigious prizes in the Spanish comics landscape with nominations and winners selected by a series of votes by industry professionals. The exceptions to this process only being the Comic Barcelona Grand Prize (a career achievement award) – whose final round is left to jury vote, and the Popular Vote Award open to the public for works released in the past year.

Categories in the 2023 edition included: the Grand Prize, Popular Vote, Best Work by a Spanish Author, Best Work by a Foreign Author, Best Work for Children and Young Adults, Best Fanzine, and the Miguel Gallardo Award for Best Newcomer.

The Comic Barcelona 2023 jury comprised artist Ana Miralles, writer David Muñoz, critic and journalist Desirée De Fez, academic Iván Pintor Iranzo, and multimedia artist and writer Teresa Valero.

You can check out the winners in all categories below.

Note: For convenience we have listed all winners and nominees in book categories with DeepL translated synopses for those yet to receive English language publication.

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2023 COMIC BARCELONA GRAND PRIZE (Gran Premio) – Trini Tinturé

The recipient of the 2023 Comic Barcelona Grand Prize (Gran Premio) career achievement award was Trini Tinturé. Born in 1935, Trinidad Tinturé Navarro is a self-taught Catalan artist who is predominantly associated with Spanish girls comics.

To pursue art she moved from Lleida to the Catalan capital Barcelona and her career took off in the 1960s, working in both advertising and on publications aimed at young girls and teenagers.

Trini Tinturé co-created the teenage witch series Emma es Encantadora [tr. Emma is Charming] with writers Francisco Pérez Navarro and Andreu Martín for weekly Lily magazine – which first saw publication in December 1981 and was exported and republished elsewhere in Europe, including Greece. She also worked for comics publications abroad – namely in the UK, Germany, and Netherlands.

 

 

POPULAR VOTE AWARD – Persona Normal [tr. Normal Person], Manuel Álvarez (Fandogamia)

 

 

BEST WORK BY A SPANISH AUTHOR

• Winner: Transitorios [tr. Transitory/Moments], Nadar (Astiberri) 
  Translated book synopsis [via DeepL]:

“The relationship between a mother and her son on the verge of puberty, an impossible assignment to represent a fictional character as real, the moral doubts surrounding a teacher, or the unique legacy of a father – are some of the issues addressed by Nadar in Transitorios, whose stories do not follow the most obvious path.”

• Chacales [tr. Jackels], Nadia Hafid  (Sapristi)Synopsis:

“Three characters with different backgrounds are about to collide. Their anger is their only connection, since all three suffer from what is known as Intermittent Explosive Disorder (IED). What motivates this uncontainable rage, and how can they channel it?”

• El fuego [tr. The Fire], David Rubín (Astiberri)Note: No translation available yet but author has had work published through Dark Horse including Ether with Matt Kindt. Synopsis:

“An immense asteroid is approaching the Earth on a collision course. Alexander Yorba, a famous middle-aged architect, is in charge of urgently designing and building a lunar colony to ensure the survival of mankind in the face of inevitable disaster.

“Immersed in this project, he is diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor; he barely has the same number of months left to live before the asteroid collides with our planet. This dramatic event will make him rethink his own professional and personal nature, which leads him to resign from his work in the colony to reunite with his family, with whom he had little contact.

“A decision that will trigger a series of fateful events that will damage Alexander’s professional credit and family life, condemning him to wander in a dramatic, visceral and revealing odyssey through different parts of the world; a desperate race towards the end of time, against death, madness and his own tormented conscience.”

• Goya: Saturnalia, Manu Gutiérrez & Manuel Romero (Cascaborra)
  Synopsis:

“During Saturnalia, slaves were freed from their obligations. At the age of seventy-three, Francisco de Goya moved to the Quinta del Sordo, an estate on the outskirts of Madrid, where he created the most personal and enigmatic works of his life, the so-called Black Paintings. Within these walls, Goya would change his vision of painting and plant the seed that would shape the future of art.”

• Loba Boreal [Daughters of Snow and Cinders],  Núria Tamarit (La Cúpula) — to be released in English with Fantagraphics May 2023

 

BEST CHILDREN’S AND YOUNG ADULT COMIC

 

• WINNER: Comiendo con Miedo [tr. Fear of Eating], Elisabeth Karin Pavón Rymer-Rythén (Astronave) 
  Synopsis:

“Like many teenagers, Elisabeth doesn’t have an easy life: her parents have divorced, she has changed schools, her grades have dropped, and people leave her life just as they enter… But in spite of this mountain of baggage, there is one thing that sets her apart from the rest: Elisabeth has Nore.

“Nore accompanies her at all times, makes her feel safe and tells her how beautiful she looks when she loses weight. Nore also forbids her to eat, checks her calories and tells her off if she doesn’t listen. And Elisabeth listens to her. Until, one day, her body reaches its limit and she is admitted to the White Room, where monsters like Nore are not allowed to enter.”

• La pequeña genia y la partida de Shatranj [tr. The Little Genie – Shatranj Departure], Álvaro Ortiz (Astiberri)Note: Ortiz has had several works released in English, most recently Ashes from Top Shelf in February 2023. Synopsis:

“Once upon a time, there was a sultan of a distant land who had two wishes left to make to a genie. Encouraged by his daughter Amina and the melancholy of the lonely life in the palace, the monarch decided to summon the genie to ask him for something as simple as an opponent to play shatranj, an ancient board game similar to chess. Both are astonished when, instead of the genie, Ayu, his daughter, appears and offers to fulfill the wish. However, the little genie is still very young and does not seem to know much about shatranj or magic… The two girls and their friend Ahmed will have to travel far to recover the blunders of Ayu, inexperienced apprentice genie.”

• Mandarina, Amelia Navarro & Sergio Salma (Nuevo Nueve)Synopsis:

“Mandarina is a girl who, like most families, is encircled by her mother and father. She is an only child, lives in a house and has friends at school. But one day when she returns home she discovers an argument between her parents. Soon after, they separate. Then a new life will begin for Mandarina, who will spend one week with her mother in an apartment in the city shopping and the next with her father in a house in the country, enjoying the countryside. Everything will become different, she will feel the lack of one of her parents every week, which has never happened in the past. Now she has the feeling of not knowing who she is.”

• Mikoo y el cinturó màgic [tr. Mikoo and the Magic Belt], Rafa Barragán & Sandra Díaz (Astronave)Synopsis:

“Join Mikoo and his gang on an unforgettable adventure! Mikoo and his gang find one day a very peculiar belt that has the power to grant wishes and can even talk! All five of them will have fun together and become good friends, but it seems that some mysterious beings want to take possession of the magic belt”

• Perdidos en el futuro 1. La tempestad [tr. Lost in the Future 1: The Storm], Damián and Àlex Fuentes (Astiberri)Synopsis:

“Some high school students have gone on a field trip to the ruins of an old castle. At the end of the day a storm breaks out and, on the way to the bus, Sara, Mei, Arnold and Driss are the victims of a new prank by Piero, the class bully. The consequences of his prank are terrible: the five teenagers fall into a wormhole that takes them to the future. A future where humanity has disappeared from the face of the Earth and where nature has regained control of the planet. The four friends will have to find their way home and gather the courage to confront Piero.”

 

BEST WORK BY A FOREIGN AUTHOR

   

• WINNER: Dulce de leche, Miguel Vila (La Cúpula) — first published in Italy as Fiordilatte (2021), English edition – Milky Way – coming from Fantagraphics late 2023

• Escucha, hermosa Márcia,  Marcello Quintanilha (Astiberri) — Brazilian Quintanilha is based in France. The French debut of this graphic novel won the 2022 Angouleme Grand Prix. The English edition – Listen, Beautiful Marcia – will be coming from Fantagraphics in May 2023.

• Hierba [Grass], Keum Suk Gendry Kim (Reservoir Books) — Korean author. Graphic novel published in English as Grass from Drawn & Quarterly in 2019

• In, Will McPhail (Norma Editorial) – New Yorker cartoonist based in UK. English edition debuted 2021 from Mariner Books (US)/Sceptre (UK)

• Túneles [Tunnels], Rutu Modan (Salamandra Graphic [Spanish Edition] and Editorial Finestres [Catalan Edition]) — Israel’s Rutu Modan. English edition published in 2021 by Drawn & Quarterly

 

MIGUEL GALLARDO AWARD FOR BEST NEW AUTHOR

• WINNER: Mariano Pardo 
• Carlos Moreno Rueda  
• Julia Cejas 
• Manuel Romero  
• Paula Cheshire

 

BEST FANZINE

• WINNER: One Shot JAM, Various
• Amorcito, Various 
• Arrojaré a los perros tu cadáver, Juan Alcudia and Manu Gutiérrez  
• La máquina de albóndigas, Various
• Neodimio fanzine, Various 

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