Ismael Terriza Reguillos

Ismael Terriza Reguillos is a prominent Spanish journalist, author, and cultural promoter, co-founder and Communications Director of the international tARTget Painting Prize, and a judge of the Third Venice International Watercolor Festival.

Born and raised in Daimiel, in the La Mancha region of Spain, Ismael studied international relations before embarking on a career in journalism. He has worked for many years as a reporter at the Madrid headquarters of Onda Cero, one of Spain's leading national radio networks, earning a reputation for his deep humanistic sensibility and his fluent, engaging narrative style. His work consistently bridges the rigor of investigative journalism with the expressive power of literary writing.

As an author, Ismael devoted years of intensive research to his historical novel Cruz con Martillo: La República en un burgo podrido (Cross with Hammer: The Republic in a Rotten Borough), drawing on extensive oral history interviews with local witnesses, and meticulous study of historical archives and period documents. Set in Daimiel on the eve of the Spanish Civil War, the book offers a panoramic reconstruction of the political fractures and social tensions that defined Spain between 1931 and 1936. Upon publication, it was widely praised and recognized as a significant contribution to regional historical literature in Spain. Notably, the illustrations for each chapter were created especially for the book by the artist Gómez-Cambronero — a creative partnership that would later give rise to their co-founding of the tARTget Painting Prize.

In the field of art promotion, Ismael serves as Communications Director of the tARTget Painting Prize, overseeing media strategy and content production for the competition. He also authors feature articles for the tARTget Magazine, covering topics ranging from art history and the relationship between Olympism and painting, to the intersections of art and literature — building a cultural narrative for the prize that combines scholarly depth with broad public appeal.