EXTRACTS: Illustrators issue 22 © 2018 The Book Palace (96 PAGES in Full edition)

59 success in no small part thanks to Bermejo’s drawings, characterized by the breath-taking pace of his action sequences that became the staple of his artwork. As Bermejo matured as an artist, most of the work he did in the second half of the ’50s was for Editorial Maga, a publishing house founded by his first mentor, Manuel Gago. There he drew such series as Roque Brío (a detective accompanied by a child), collaborated on Pantera Negra ( Black Panther , a sort of Jungle Book tale about a boy and his panther) and Apache (a western series). This last series was immensely popular thanks to Bermejo’s mastery on the action sequences. In 1960 Bermejo moved to Valencia, where he shared a studio with José Ortiz and his nephew Leopoldo Sánchez. These artists would later form part of the Valencia group that also included Ortiz’s brother Leopoldo, and artists Miguel Quesada, Juan González Alacreu and later Matías Alonso. With the latter he collaborated on a series of trading card albums. He also illustrated several instalments of a collection of novels with comic strip inserts that adapted and abridged many literary classics for Editorial Bruguera (at the time, the largest publishing house in Spain). By then his work for Aventuras del FBI had been translated into various languages and sold all over Europe, but it was via the Bardon Art agency, which he joined in 1957, that his client base became truly international. Through Jordi Macabich, Bardon Art’s Barcelona director, he worked for the British comics industry, first with romantic stories for Mirabelle , later in all FACING PAGE: Aventuras del FBI, published by Rollán (1951). ABOVE: Apache , published by Maga (1956). BELOW: Detail from Heros the Spartan , pen and ink and watercolour (1967). © IPC Media