Tàssies

Tàssies, whose origins reflect the judicious yet passionate character of the Catalans and the noble and obstinate nature of the Aragonese, was born on 13 November 1963 in Barbastro, in Aragon, and now lives in Brunyola, in Catalonia, in a landscape dominated by hazelnut trees.


After graduating in journalism from the Autonomous University of Barcelona and obtaining a Masters in Publishing from the University of Barcelona, his first drawings were published in newspapers in 1983. In 1991 he won the Children’s Book Week First Prize for the Spanish section of IBBY, enabling him to present his innovative but controversial style that even today continues to divide opinion in Spain.
In 1997 he was awarded Second Prize for the Best Children’s Book by the Spanish Ministry of Culture, in 2001 he won the Apel·les Mestres Award, and twice – in 2005 and 2007 – his colleagues at the Associació Professional d’Il·lustradors de Catalunya presented him with the Junceda Award in recognition of his work with the press.

International awards:

Plaque BIB (Biennial of Illustration Bratislava) and Diploma of the Premio Iberoamericano de Ilustración in 1993 for his illustrations of the mediaeval moral poem Llibre de bons amonestaments by Anselm Turmeda, Barcelona, Publicacions de l’Abadia de Montserrat, 1992.

Premio Internacional de Ilustración della Fundación SM 2008 for the new work El nen perdut (The Lost Child), an anti-war short story that explores conflict and hope from the perspective of children.
The book has been published in Spanish (El niño perdido) by Ediciones SM, Madrid, 2008, and in the original Catalan version by Editorial Cruïlla, Barcelona, 2008. Nel 2009, he became the first Spanish illustrator to receive the prestigious Bratislava award, the Grand Prix BIB 2009, for El nen perdut.
Tàssies’s personal exhibition at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair will feature a number of original illustrations from his latest work Noms robats (Stolen Names), a moving story about bullying.