Daniel Thomás puts a face to the shops of Sant Antoni

Daniel Thomás portrays the shopkeepers on the shutters of 17 shops in Som Sant Antoni as part of the Persianes que fan barri project.

Daniel Thomás is the artist behind the shutters of the Som Sant Antoni shopping axis, in the district of Eixample, within the Persianes que fan barri project: a street art intervention on 185 shops across Barcelona, organised by the Barcelona Creativity & Design Foundation with creative direction by Rebobinart.

Daniel Thomás is an illustrator, draughtsman and street artist from Barcelona who works mainly in public space through murals and interventions on shop shutters. His work is defined by a graphic language close to illustration, with vivid colours and expressively drawn characters that seek to strengthen the identity of neighbourhoods and to celebrate local commerce and community life. He has developed projects in Barcelona and its metropolitan area, turning street art into a tool for transforming and dignifying everyday space.

Daniel Thomás’s style: every shop has a name, a face and a story

The Sant Antoni series is built on portraiture: local commerce has a name, a face and a story. Every shutter hides a story — that of the person who raises the shutter each morning — and every portrait makes it visible.

Graphically, Daniel Thomás works with a reduced palette of coral pink, red, very dark blue and cream: large masses of flat colour, thick outlines and linear shading reminiscent of advertising illustration and retro comics, with small floating icons — glasses, cameras, tools, spectacles — that explain what each business does.