[1] Isabel Quintanilla was born in the Pacifico neighborhood of Madrid on July 22, 1938 to José Antonio and María Ascensión.

He was killed in 1941 in a Francoist concentration camp in Burgos, after which her mother worked as a dressmaker to support Quintanilla and her sister.

[3] Quintanilla began studying art at an early age, attending drawing and painting classes in the studios of Maroussia Valero and Manuel Gutiérrez Navas.

[6] The couple returned to Madrid in 1965 and Quintanilla focused her work on still lives, painting intimate portraits of objects around her house, such as cups, sewing machines, and lamps.

[2] In 1996, she was the subject of a retrospective at the Centro Cultural Conde Duque in Madrid, as well as a solo exhibition at Galería Leandro Navarro.