Granell, Eugenio

A Coruña 1912-Madrid 2001. Exile, painter, professor, writer and musician.

After finishing high school and beginning his musical training in Santiago de Compostela, he moved to Madrid to study violin at the Escuela Superior de Música in 1928. There he takes part in literary and political gatherings. In 1935 he joined the P.O.U.M. (Workers’ Party of Marxist Unification). During the Spanish Civil War he enlisted Republican militias, directed the newspaper Combatiente Rojo, and collaborated in other publications such as Hora de España.

He began his exile in France in 1939, where he was sent to several concentration camps. Later, he headed for Latin America. He settled in the Dominican Republic with his partner, the painter Amparo Segarra. He took an active part in the cultural life of this country, but left for Guatemala after refusing to sign a letter of support for the regime of dictator Trujillo. He taught Fine Arts and exhibited his work until left again because of the Guatemalan revolution. He resided for a time in Puerto Rico, and moved to New York in 1957, remaining in this city until 1985.

In New York he completed a doctorate in Sociology and Anthropology from the New School for Social Research, worked as a Professor of Spanish Literature at Brooklyn College, and exhibited his surrealist paintings. Also during this period, he published a series of fictional texts, such as the novels La novela del Indio Tupinamba (1959), Lo que sucedió… (1968) and the collection of short stories Federica no era tonta (1970). He collaborated with the Galician exile José Rubia Barcia, illustrating his book Umbral de sueños (1961).

He returned to Spain in 1985. The Eugenio Granell Foundation was created in Santiago de Compostela in 1995, and in 1997 this same city named him ‘adopted son’ and awarded him the Medalla de Ouro ao Mérito Cultural. He passed away in Madrid in 2001. The Xunta de Galicia posthumously awarded him the Medalla de Ouro de Galicia (Sources: Web of the Eugenio Granell Foundation, Prólogue by Claudio Rodríguez Fer to Federica no era tonta).