Genís Rigol: "Entering Fatbottom made me a comic author"

BarcelonaLike many other children, Genís Rigol (Barcelona, 1982) grew up reading comics, especially from the golden age of Franco-Belgian comics such as Tintin, Spirou and Marsupilami. But the moment that led him to want to draw comics came when he was older, when he discovered a comic book store in Poble-sec. “I liked to draw and had done animations, but entering Fatbottom turned me into a comic author –he recalls–. I discovered the fanzines of Alexis Nolla, Pau Anglada and Marc Torices and I started making short strips. And it helped me realize that I could jump in and make comics simply as a recreational activity, without needing formal training. In the end, it is a technologically very simple medium: all you need is paper, a pen, and a boring afternoon. But before, I thought you had to be Franco-Belgian, at least, to make a comic.”

In November 2025, after many years of fanzines, collaborations, and animation projects, Rigol published his first full-length comic, Brunilda en la Plata (Apa Apa), an impressive debut that El ARA chose as one of the five best comics of 2025. Set behind the scenes of a giant theatre where a play has been running for days, the comic follows Norman's efforts to arrive on time for a date he has with a girl outside the theatre. The problem is that to leave he would have to cross the stage, and the play seems to go on forever. As if in a feverish dream, Norman explores all the corners of this impossible theatre to convince the playwright to write him a small part so he can enter and exit the stage without interrupting the performance. “For a while I read books on playwriting, and they all talk about the same thing: the inciting incident, the objective, and a series of obstacles to achieve the objective –recalls Rigol–. In theory, the obstacle will be more interesting and profound when it is more internal and has to do with the character's contradictions, but I found it very amusing for it to be the opposite, something physical and external like crossing a stage.”

It also seems like a challenge to dramatic conventions, the choice of a character without personality like Norman, almost a blank canvas onto which the reader can project whatever they want. “Yes, he’s a bit like Tintin, who is a somewhat empty character and you don’t really know what he likes or what he wants from life, but it wasn’t a conscious decision, it just happened by chance,” explains Rigol. Although integrated into a kind of surreal vaudeville, Brunilda en la Plata is full of very personal elements for the author, starting with the dream that served as the seed for the comic, to his grandmother's recipes, or the shame he used to feel when he liked a girl, which made him hide his emotions just like Norman does.

In fact, Rigol's comic is above all a personal exorcism of his self-critical voice, the one that questions and sabotages his creativity, an inner voice that, according to the cartoonist, “if we are honest, we all hear inside our heads.” In this sense, making humor about the subject has allowed him to “silence and attenuate these voices” and, therefore, to work on the comic “with much more lightness and without so much neurosis.” Although, ironically, the success and good reception of the comic is now spoiling the therapeutic benefit. “The other day I caught myself thinking that until I make four or five comics that are good, I won’t have proven anything, because maybe this one turned out well by pure luck,” he reflects, amused and resigned to living with insecurity.

Copy the classics

One of the most fascinating aspects of Brunilda en la Plata is the splendor of Rigol's drawing, which accommodates everything from modern influences (Oliver Schrauwen) to, above all, many references to the pioneers of comics from the early 20th century. “At first I copied many authors from that era: George McManus, Winsor McCay, Frank King, George Herriman... And then, looking for films about the world of theater, I found Children of Paradise by Marcel Carné, which influenced me a lot,” explains Rigol, who prefers to talk about copies rather than influences. “There is a page that is very similar to a mythical sunday page by Frank King, and I like to say that I copied it to demystify this thing about originality – Rigol says. When you've been making a comic for a long time, your life goes on, and everything that happens to you or what you read is incorporated in some way into the final result.” These classic influences can also be observed in the series that the cartoonist has been publishing in ARA since April 12: Renau the stubborn.

Beyond references, Rigol's drawing seduces with the voluptuousness of the page designs and architectural structures, a feast for the senses that intoxicates the pupils and, above all, conveys an absolute joy in the drawing itself. “There are very good authors who don't enjoy drawing, but I'm one of those who really like to draw, and I think it shows in the result, because I let myself go and suddenly you reach new places,” he assures. This flow with the rhythm also leads him to include in the middle of the comic a poem by Enric Casasses, Declaration. “It’s a poem that Miguel Poveda set to music and that I love because it talks about catúfols, the clay containers that draw water from the well – he explains. It has something mysterious: some verses I understand perfectly and others I don't understand at all, but I love how it sounds in Catalan.” Catalan is, in fact, the language in which he wrote the comic, although he later translated it into Spanish, and this is the final version that has been published. “But I would love for it to be published in Catalan – he assures. All the fanzines I made before were in Catalan, they were the underground of the underground. And now that I live in France, I have even more passion for Catalan. Living abroad makes you value your own language.”

In France, Rigol lives precisely in Angoulême, the capital of French-language comics, where he first went with a grant from the Maison des Auteurs and then stayed to live. A large part of Brunilda en la Plata was drawn there. “Life at La Maison des Auteurs was a bit difficult at first, because it coincided with the lockdown and I felt very isolated – he recalls. But with time you get used to it and you meet people. And I really like the size of the city, that it's small and has a river. If you take a bike, you can be in the forest in five minutes.” Rigol, of course, witnessed firsthand the controversy that led to the cancellation of the last Angoulême Festival, but he has mixed feelings about it. “On the one hand, I feel proud that a stand is being taken because what the festival directors did is unacceptable and I am in favor of the reaction against the festival, but at the same time I think there are many people who are not sincere with the reasons they give to defend the boycott, and who are only interested in the battle for control of the new festival,” he explains. Rigol, with his girlfriend, organized an exhibition about Brunilda en la Plata at an alternative and independent festival that was held in the city on the dates of the cancelled edition. And a few days ago he inaugurated another exhibition at the Huberty & Breyne gallery in Paris. “I would love to be able to exhibit in Barcelona,” he admits.