Eider Perez and Ibon Illarramendi, holding a freshly baked book in their hands.
The authors of the illustrated album are the writer Eider Perez from Pasaia and the illustrator Ibon Illarramendi from Zarauz
It was announced in June that the 2022 Etxepare award would go to ‘Kiratsa’ by writer Eider Perez and director Ibon Illarramendi. They received the award in July with a bouquet of flowers. This time, with each copy in their hands, they presented the illustrated album recently published by the Pamiela publishing house.
Since 2007, 35 works have been submitted to the competition organized by the Basque language services of various local entities in Navarre this year, five more than last year, and as many as in the 2020 edition, which has been the most productive so far. As happened in some of the previous editions, Perez and Illarramendi did one in the BikoTeka initiative that the Galtzagorri Association usually does in Pamplona.
The illustrated album ‘Kiratsa’ focuses on the adventures of the flea Ñimi and presents us with a reflection on good and bad smells: what is a smell, what is a perfume, what is a stench… Kukusoa has reached the elegant dog Pantxi and the two set off in search of a smell.
As they stated, “the text is more suitable for an album: short, rhyming, rich and based on onomatopoeia. Couldn’t be more suitable for reciting and having fun. The illustrations are elegant, sophisticated – they offer many echoes, such as René Magritte’s skies – and, above all, very narrative and full of musicality. The combination between the text and the illustrations is top-notch and it can be said that the writer-illustrators have achieved an album, illustrated, playful and harmonious, a real gift for readers, which will make them want to read and smell again and again.’
Regarding the authors, Iban Illarramendi Echabe (1973, Zarautz). The illustrator and graphic designer works mainly in the world of publishing and advertising. He makes illustrations for many media; posters, skateboards, window displays, album covers or clothing. He also teaches experimental illustration workshops for children, and has held several individual and collective exhibitions.
Eider Pérez ‘Adeletx’ (1995, Pasaia Trintxerpe), on the other hand, works in many fields. He has published several texts in the magazine Lekore, in the group works of the creative collective Txakur Gorria and in the collections of some literary awards, among others, and he has collaborated in Oarsoaldeka Hitza and some other collective publications. He created the dramatized poetry recital ‘Autobiographical’ together with Ane Zubeldia and ‘Andre eta Jabe’, a show about the career of Basque women poets, was later performed by the musician Leire Etxezarreta in collaboration with him. He has worked as a presenter, screenwriter and creative teacher, and he is also very close to acting, for example as the presenter of the show ‘From the teeth to the teeth’.