The story of the birth of Mafalda, the emblematic character of Quino who continues to mark generations

It was in 1962 when the Argentinian artist and designer, Joaquín Salvador Lavado Tejón -better known as Cinchona — received a call from the Agens Publicité agency .

In her, They asked him to create a comic strip to promote an appliance company called Mansfield. .

The plan was to make a comic strip that would show a typical family from the transandean country, who will use said products and display the company name at the end from the last thumbnail.

In this way, They could offer it for free to the media of the time, in exchange for its full publication. and so they could do a kind of implicit advertising.

Quino accepted the challenge. A few weeks passed and he came back with a proposal. .

Such drawings were a first idea of ​​what would later become the Mafalda that we know today, even if at that time, he still did not have the same personality and it had some notable aesthetic differences.

For example, her legs were longer and thinner while the details of his body were less characteristic.

As for his name, they wanted it to start with the same letters as Mansfield, so after hearing the name “Mafalda” in the film Face to face (1962) by director José Martínez Suárez, decided to name it like that .

With his drawings under his arm, Quino I spoke with the people from Agens Publicité .

However, They told him his plan had failed because the media wouldn’t publish the comic strip without paying. A commission.

After receiving this response, the artist kept the sketches in a drawer .

Two years have passed until they finally get out of there. However, in doing so, they were no longer positioning themselves as part of a company’s advertising.

Mafalda was preparing to lead her own life with Quino’s support .

In 1964, a journalist and friend of Quino named Julián Delgado asked him if he had any drawings that could be published in the media Primera Plana. .

The artist told him that He had Mafalda’s sketches and proposed the idea to her. .

They both reached an agreement and They decided to publish two strips per week with her as the protagonist.

On September 29, 1964, the first Mafalda cartoons appeared. . These were on pages 22 and 64 of the diary and in one of them you can see a conversation he has with his father.

—Are you a good father?

—And… I think so.

—But are you the best, the best, the best of all, of all, of all the dads in the world?

-Well I don’t know. Maybe there is another father who is better than me.

—I assumed!

It was a first sample of what would later be the development of his iconic personality, through which he always provides disconcerting answers to the other characters and, of course, to the readers.

Even if it’s a girl, His thoughts reflect deep social critiques .

This way challenges issues such as gender stereotypes, the beauty industry, environmental deterioration and consumerism to name just a few that still remain latent both in Argentina and in the world.

With time, The details of the drawing became more precise and its character was accentuated. .

Another vignette from Mafalda that shows the above – in a more direct tone – is this: .

SO, made his father understand that he was outraged by a decision made by a referee during a football match, while at the same time there are children who are suffering (news to which the newspaper did not pay attention).

These aspects made it become a cultural phenomenon . In this way, not only surprises, but also raises questions .

That This is also seen through characters like his mother and the other children that Quino has added to his world. like Susanita, Felipe, Manolito, Guille (his younger brother), Miguelito and Libertad.

Each of them represents archetypes of society. And also, some elements of the artist’s inner world .

Nephew of Quino, flautist and professor at the Music Institute of the Catholic University of Chile, Guillermo Lavado, states in a conversation with La Tercera that his uncle “was a very withdrawn person, very introverted, but who gave a lot of himself in the intimate sphere”. .

“As in many other professions, writing and graphically expressing an idea There is reflection and reflection. There are a lot of things that come out of it that make it so transcendent. . We must also understand that many of us have gone through different stages in a short time. In cases like Quino’s, or mine, we had an upbringing in the middle of a completely sexist society, but with certain exceptions in the privacy of each family.

Concerning the artist’s experience, he details that “He grew up in a family of Andalusians who left Spain before the war. He was born in 1932 and my father, his older brother, in 1925. .

“Both They had a bit of this imprint of the society they lived in, but each one evolves and revolutionizes their own adult education by making changes, which is very much reflected in their work. . In (for example) this careful look at women’s oppression and liberation.

Under this line, Lavado, who is one of the heirs responsible for disseminating the work of the cartoonist, affirms that “In fact, he was in Paris in May 1968, which had a huge impact on him” .

“He was nourished by many other artists, particularly from cinema, who expanded a universe of emotions, cultures and stimuli” .

In 1976, Quino and his wife, doctor of chemistry Alicia Colombo, They emigrated from Argentina to Italy .

Concerning this period, Lavado assures that Quino “was saved” because they were in the middle of an era where “the security service was in this nascent task of perfecting intelligence.” for everything that happened afterwards.

With the latter, refers to “what has become of this apparatus of kidnappings, torture and murders that was the military regime”. in Argentina”.

After publishing in other spaces such as the newspaper El Mundo de Buenos Aires and the weekly Siete Días, in addition to publishing books with Mafalda’s caricatures, The last day his articles appeared on newsstands was June 25, 1973. .

Approximately A decade later, Quino and Colombo returned to Argentina permanently. .

For this period, Guillermo Lavado lived with them .

“Everything that was his life and His thinking at work reflects that he was an extremely observant person and that he synthesized everything he wanted to say very well. (…) With a depth that has made it a universal classic “.

Although Quino died on September 30, 2020, The entirety of his work – and not just the world of Mafalda – continues to be acclaimed by readers on all continents. .

To commemorate the 60th anniversary of Mafalda and the celebration of the 70th anniversary of Quino’s work, Lavado states that They organize different exhibitions in Spain and in their country of origin.

Furthermore, They plan to do an exhibition in Chile in collaboration with the Argentine Embassy details which will be shared soon.

You can learn more about Quino’s work and life by doing click on this link .

With, you can watch the documentary series Reread Mafalda via the streaming platform Disney+ . In this document, different artists, researchers and people who shared with him tell about aspects related to their creations and what was the path to achieve them.