Byron Galvez, Mexican (1941 - 2009)

**Byron Galvez was born in 1941 in Mixquiahuata, State of Hidalgo, Mexico. His childhood artistic abilities were influenced and cultivated mainly by his Father, who was a merchant and farmer but was also very passionate about literature and played violin a a jazz band..

AT 16 he moved to Mexico City to study art at the San Carlos National College of Visual Arts. His teachers were, among others, The Spanish painter Antonio Rodriguez Luna, the etching master, Francisco Moreno Capdevila, Luis Nushizawa, Santos Balmori and Antonio Ramirez.. AS a Post graduate student, he was the founding member of the Metal Sculpture Workshop of the National School of Fine Arts of the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

In 1964 he held his first individual exhibit and since then has held over 60 in the major forums of Mexico and various cities throughout the United States, Europe and Latin America. He has also participated in copious collective exhibits. A singular occurance in his career occurred when the actor Vincent Price bought every work that made up his first individual exhiobits and named him "a Mexican Picasso".

Since then he has been honored with over 15 awards and honors, recognizing his diverse and vast creations.

His mediums include etching, sculpture, sketch and painting. His works are in important private collections in Mexico and abroad. He has had outstanding articles writen about his works by such writers as Jorge Juan Crespo de la Sema, Alejandro Aura, Berta Taracena, Santos Balmori, Pablo Fernandez Marquez, Eririque F. Gual and Margarita Eiken.

In 2001 he began his project, the Daven Ben Gurion Cultural Park. This urban mega-project has invaluable social and artistic repercussions for the state of Hidalgo. It is located in the metropolitan zone of the city of Pachuca. It contains the Museum of Contemporary Art of Hidalgo, the Silver Drop Auditorium, a convention center, a Library, a Sculpture park, jopgging circuit, an open air audiorama, inspired by the pre-colombian architecture and a first-class hotel, as the central esplanade,

Byron Galvez passed away on October 27, 2009. **