19th-20th Century Spanish

Born in Barcelona, this Spanish illustrator and painter was one of the foremost chroniclers of his time. A pupil of Ramón Martí i Alsina (1826-1894), he furthered his training as a painter in Rome, where he spent three years. Back in Barcelona he worked as an illustrator, occasionally under the pseudonym of Nyap or Nyapus.

Pellicer Fenyé worked as a graphic correspondent during the Third Carlist War (1872-1876) and the Russo-Turkish War (1877-78). Known primarily as a cartoonist, his works were published in journals such as La Ilustración Española y Americana (Madrid) and L’Ilustration (Paris). He also created illustrations for books, including the two-volume deluxe edition of El ingenioso hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (1880-1883); La leyenda del Cid, by Zorrilla (1882); and some of the Episodios Nacionales by Pérez Galdós (1883-1885), all of which were released by Montaner y Simón, the publishing house from Barcelona for which he was artistic director.

One of his most outstanding works as a painter was Zitto, silenzio, che passa la ronda, for which he obtained a third medal at the 1871 National Exposition of Fine Arts, currently belonging to the Prado museum.

A foremost player in the cultural scene of his time, in 1888 Pellicer Fenyéwas commissioned to organise the Barcelona Universal Exposition. The first director of the Museo de Reproducciones, he was also appointed president of the Catalan Institute of Book Art and in 1894 he was appointed a member of the Academy of Fine Arts of Barcelona.