Ricardo Martinez Ortega

Ricardo Martinez Ortega (b. 1956; Santiago) moved to Spain with his family in May 1969. Ricardo began his professional career towards the end of the 1970s. At that time, he was creating illustrations for several publications, advertising agencies, and comic books. In 1981 he went to Miami, where he worked at an ad agency, creating ads for Seven Up, Dr. Pepper, and American Express, among others; and movie posters. Shortly thereafter, he was hired to the staff of the daily paper ‘The Miami News’ as designer/illustrator/graphic artist. After six years there, the paper was sold to Knight Ridder Inc., and Ricardo went on to be Op/Ed illustrator for the ‘Miami Herald’. While still in Miami, Ricardo and writer-childhood friend Nacho published ‘Goomer’ the comic strip continuously since 1987, first in the Spanish daily ‘El Pais’ and since 1990 in ‘El Mundo’. In 1989, Ricardo returned to Madrid with his American wife to form a part of the founding group of ‘El Mundo’ newspaper in October of 1989, as Assistant Managing Editor of Illustration. He formed and headed the Art Department, managing both illustrations and graphics. In May 1990, he began to publish editorial cartoons which he did alongside writer and business partner, Nacho. This was at the same that he was still Art Director, as well as doing the Op/Ed drawing every Sunday. Nacho stopped working on the political cartoon in February 2002 and since then Ricardo has has been writer and artist for this political cartoon. While at El Mundo, Ricardo has done illustrations for Coca Cola, Madrid City Hall, Telefonica, UNICEF, Amnesty International, and Renault, among others. Among celebrities that own Ricardo’s drawings are Kofi Anaan, Juan Carlos I, the King of Spain, Bill Clinton, Juan Antonio Samaranch. Among museums that own Ricardo’s drawings are the Lausanne Olympic Museum, The National Library of Madrid, the Museo de Dibujo del Castillo de Larrés, and the Bill Clinton Library, among others. He has won several awards, among them 8 gold and a ‘Judge’s Special Recognition’ from the Society of Newspaper Design, for his illustrations on the Sunday Op/Ed pages that he did for ‘The Miami Herald’ and ‘El Mundo’. He also received the International Press Award; the prestigious Madrid Premio Tono; The Haxtur Award in Gijón, Spain Comic Festival; the ‘Gat Perich’ given by the editors of newspapers in Barcelona. His works have appeared in the annual collections of The Society of Illustrators in New York, and in several collected works. His comic strip ‘Goomer’ was syndicated in the US by Creator’s Syndicate in 1991 and enjoyed a stint in papers worldwide. ‘Goomer’ was made into a film in Spain in 1998 and was awarded the prestigious ‘Goya’ for Best Animated Feature Length film that year. There are eight published collected works of ‘Goomer’.