Julio Valdez
Julio Valdez
Julio Valdez

Julio Valdez

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BiographyJulio Valdez is a painter, printmaker, teacher and mixed media installation artist whose work has been exhibited internationally since 1984. Born in Santo Domingo, the Dominican Republic, Julio Valdez relocated to New York in 1993. He received training in oil painting and printmaking in both his native land and New York City, and he now creates art that evokes the Caribbean region’s physical beauty and varied cultures, as well as contemporary issues of displacement and cultural identity. Valdez studied at the National School of Fine Arts in Santo Domingo and the Altos de Chavόn School of Design in the Dominican Republic. In 1994 he founded Julio Valdez Studio, which specializes in non-toxic contemporary printmaking processes.

Valdez was granted his first museum exhibition at the Omar Rayo Museum in Colombia in 1988, and he later received a solo exhibition at the Organization of American States in Washington, DC. He has received numerous prizes at the Santo Domingo Museo de Arte Moderno national biennials, the Grand Prize at the International Drawing Biennial, Palace of Fine Arts, Santo Domingo, and fellowships from the New York Foundation for the Arts; the National Academy and Museum, New York; and the Robert Blackburn Printmaking Workshop. In 2005, he was nominated to the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His works are held by the Library of Congress and the US Department of State Art in Embassies Program permanent collection, as well as many public, private, and museum collections worldwide. The book Julio Valdez, by Federica Palomero, was published in 2009. Valdez has presented thirty solo exhibitions and is a regular exhibitor at the Affordable Art Fair as well as Art on Paper, both in New York. He was part of the official representation of the Dominican Republic at the 58th Venice Biennale.

Person TypeArtist