Manuel Ferrol - Photographs.

Manuel Ferrol (1923–2003) was a Galician photographer, born at the lighthouse of Cabo Vilán (Costa da Morte, Galicia). He initially commenced studies in nautical engineering but abandoned them to devote himself fully to photography. Over the early 1950s he opened his first photography studio, first in Betanzos, then later moving to A Coruña, where he worked as a portraitist and later as a photo-reporter.

In 1957, he was commissioned by the Instituto Español de Emigración to document the mass departure of Galician emigrants from the port of A Coruña aboard the transatlantic ship Juan de Garay bound for Buenos Aires. From this assignment came the photograph known as El Padre y El Hijo, often cited as the emblematic image of post-war Spanish and Galician emigration. He used a Rolleiflex camera (viewed from above) so as not to disturb the families and was able to capture the intimate emotional intensity of the departure scene.

Throughout his life Ferrol produced an extensive body of work beyond that single image, documenting everyday life in Galicia, traditional customs, fishing communities, markets, children, religious festivals, and more. His archive comprises thousands of negatives, and his reputation grew posthumously: today his work is part of the permanent collection of the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid. His record of social-historical photography makes him one of the most important Spanish photographers of the 20th century.

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