THE FUNERARY STELE OF EVARIST FÀBREGAS

This piece is another example of Romantic design: the Funerary Stele at the tomb of the Reus-born philanthropist Evarist Fàbregas i Pàmies. Created in 1960 by local sculptor Joan Rebull, the stele presents a purely symbolic iconography—a female figure kneeling, offering a laurel wreath to the deceased, symbolizing the triumph of the spirit.

Evarist Fàbregas i Pàmies (Reus, 1868 – Barcelona, 1938) was a businessman, politician, and philanthropist, and served as president of the Centre de Lectura from 1905 to 1908. He was also one of its greatest benefactors.

Fàbregas was a partner in Folch i Fàbregas, a public works and transportation company, and Fàbregas i Garcia, a shipping company. He worked as a customs agent in Tarragona and Reus before moving to Barcelona, where he co-founded the banking house Fàbregas i Recasens (1917) with Eduard Recasens i Mercadé. In 1920, the bank was restructured into the Banc de Catalunya, with Fàbregas serving as its first president and director. While involved in its operations, he remained in the background compared to the Recasens brothers, Eduard and Francesc. Fàbregas gifted the Centre de Lectura of Reus its social building and financed the early stages of Josep Canals' theatre company (1917), the most prominent Catalan theatre troupe of the 1920s, which performed at Barcelona’s Romea Theatre.