Juan Díaz Canales is a Spanish comics artist and an

animated Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most ani ...

film director, known as the co-creator of '' Blacksad''.

Biography

At an early age, Juan Díaz Canales became interested in comics and their creation, which progressed and broadened out to include animated films. At the age of 18, he entered a school for animation. In 1996 he founded, together with three other artists, a company called Tridente Animation. Through this, he has worked with European and American companies, providing plots and scripts for comics and animation films, as well as directing animated television series and animation movies. During this period he met Juanjo Guarnido, with whom Canales decided to create comics based around a private investigator, Blacksad. After contacting several editors, Guarnido and Canales finally signed on with French publisher

Dargaud Société Dargaud, doing business as Les Éditions Dargaud, is a publisher of Franco-Belgian comics series, headquartered in the 18th arrondissement of Paris. It was founded in 1936 by Georges Dargaud (), publishing its first comics in 1943. ...

, and in November 2000, ''Quelque part entre les ombres (Somewhere within the Shadows)'' was published. It was a great success with both critics and the public, and was awarded the Prix de la Découverte at the Sierre International Comics Festival and the "Avenir" Prize at the

Lys-lez-Lannoy Lys-lez-Lannoy (, literally ''Lys near Lannoy''; West Flemish: ''Lis by Lannoy'') is a commune in the Nord department in northern France. It is part of the Métropole Européenne de Lille. Population Heraldry See also *Communes of the Nord ...

Festival, in Switzerland and France respectively. In March 2003 the second album ''Arctic-Nation'', was released. It was once again a great success, winning the Angoulême

Audience Award An audience award is typically an award at a film festival (or some other type of cultural festival or similar competition) which is selected by the audience attending the festival, rather than by the festival jury or a group of critics. Example ...

and the Festival Prize for Artwork in 2004. The third instalment of the ''Blacksad'' series, ''Âme Rouge (Red Soul)'', was published in 2005. In 2006 it was awarded the Angoulême Prize for a Series. In 2015, he and artist Rubén Pellejero were chosen by Patrizia Zanotti, in charge of the copyrights to

Hugo Pratt Ugo Eugenio Prat, better known as Hugo Pratt (15 June 1927 – 20 August 1995), was an Italian comic book creator who was known for combining strong storytelling with extensive historical research on works such as ''Corto Maltese''. He was ind ...

's ''

Corto Maltese ''Corto Maltese'' is a series of adventure and fantasy comics named after the character Corto Maltese, an adventurous sailor. It was created by the Italian comic book creator Hugo Pratt in 1967. The comics are highly praised as some of the most ...

'' series, to publish a new album.''Bajo el sol de medianoche'', Juan Díaz Canales and Rubén Pellejero,

Norma Editorial Norma Editorial is a Spanish comics publisher, with its headquarters in Barcelona.Home
Norma Editori ...

, Barcelona, 2015.

Awards

*2000: Prize for Best First Album at the Lys-lez-Lannoy festival *2000: Prix spécial at the Rœulx (Belgium) festival *2000: Prix Némo at the Maisons-Laffitte festival *2000: Prix découverte at Sierre International Comics Festival *2001: Best Artwork Award at Festival de Chambéry *2002: Best Artwork Award at Grand Prix Albert Uderzo *2003: Prix spécial du jury au Sierre International Comics Festival *2004: Angoulême Audience Award, for ''Arctic-Nation'' *2004: Angoulême Best Artwork Award, for ''Arctic-Nation'' *2004: Virgin Prize for Best Album, for ''Arctic-Nation'' *2006: Angoulême Best Series Award, for the ''Blacksad'' series *2006: Bédéis Causa - Prix Maurice Petitdier for the best foreign comic at the Festival de la BD francophone de Québec for ''Blacksad''

Bibliography

* ''Blacksad'' series (Dargaud) # ''Somewhere Within the Shadows'' (2000) # ''Arctic Nation'' (2003) # ''Red Soul'' (2005) # ''A Silent Hell'' (2010) # ''Amarillo'' (2013) * '' Les Patriciens'', éd. Glénat,

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...

*# ''The imagination to power'', 2009 *'' Sous le soleil de minuit'', 2015. With artist Rubén Pellejero within the ''Corto Maltese'' series.

Notes

Sources

Canales publications in ''Pilote''
BDoubliées
Blacksadmania.com
(French)
reyes y poetas
(Spanish blog of Juan Díaz Canales) {{DEFAULTSORT:Diaz Canales, Juan Living people People from Madrid Spanish comics writers Year of birth missing (living people)