Segrelles’ output achieved great success, particularly his illustrations for stories, tales and fables.
 
With a restless and idealistic spirit, the painter instilled a sense of mysticism and symbolism into his compositions, drawing the reader into a fantastic and dream-like world that was the perfect accompaniment to the texts he illustrated. Strange actions, terrifying visions, torments, magical beings... in other words: exaltations of the imagination of an artist who, by inflaming the sublime, brings to mind the work of Johann Heinrich Füssli (1741—1825) and of the painter and poet William Blake (1757—1827).
 
This drawing is part of the series of eight watercolours Segrelles made to illustrate Dante’s Divine Comedy, a commission from the Araluce publishing house in the late 1920s. The quality of this body of work won him a Gold Medal at the 1929 Barcelona International Exposition.
 
The work in hand represents Charon, the Greek mythological character whose job was to ferry souls in his boat through the Marsh of Acheron to the underworld on the other side of the river of the dead. In payment, the souls had to give him one

 Obol 

an Obol is an ancient Greek silver coin whose value was six to a drachma. According to Greek mythology, the dead were buried with one or two obols as payment to Charon the ferryman for their journey to the underworld.

, which is why it was the custom to put a coin in the mouth of the dead when burying them. Segrelles’ depiction of the ferryman is rather disquieting: an old man with big bulging eyes, his mouth half-open and a long white beard. His face brings to mind a phantasmagorical being, with eyes and gaping mouth reminiscent of that of a snake to provoke fear and anxiety. In short, a hybrid character, half way between a man and a strange being from the depths of the sea.