State Artist Gaspar Enriquez

Description

Born in 1942 and raised in El Paso’s Segundo Barrio, Gaspar Enriquez earned a BA in art from the University of Texas at El Paso in 1970 and an MA in metals from New Mexico State University in 1985. His dramatic portraits range from works on paper of writer Rudolfo Anaya, artist Luis Jimenez, and artist John Valadez for the National Portrait Gallery at the Smithsonian, to 24-feet-high pieces commissioned for the San Antonio Convention Center, to illustrations for Rudolfo Anaya’s Elegy on the Death of Cesar Chavez. No matter their size, his powerful, acrylic, air-brushed portraits reveal his subjects’ dignity and demand the viewer’s attention. His works are held by museums including the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, the Tucson Museum of Art, the El Paso Museum of Art, and by private collectors such as Cheech Marin. Mr. Enriquez is the recipient of the Father Rahm Segundo Barrio Person of the Year Award (2016) and a Mid-America Arts Alliance Fellowship (1994). In 2015, he was named a Distinguished Alumnus of the University of Texas at El Paso.