RAUL GUTIERREZ 1935 - 0000 Born in Laredo and raised during his teen years in San Antonio, Texas, Raul Gutierrez says of his childhood, “I got to visit a lot of little ranches and see working cowboys. Sometimes, they’d even let me ride the horses and help out. So, I was fascinated with the cowboy life from an early age.” As a high school student, Gutierrez’s artistic talent was already evident, earning him a scholarship to the Warren Hunter School of Commercial and Fine Arts, where he studied in the evenings while finishing high school by day.
Gutierrez studies historical photographs when preparing to paint and works hard to accurately capture the Texas landscapes he finds so beautiful, the rocky promontories, the gnarly trees, the creek beds, the grasslands, and even the prickly pears - right down to the subtle differences in the shape and color of the varieties of prickly pears one finds around Texas. Among the many collections that include art by Raul Gutierrez are: the late President Lyndon B. Johnson, country singer George Strait, Senator Barry Goldwater, Secretary of the Treasury and Governor of Texas John B. Connally, San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, co-founder of Clear Channel Communications Red McCombs, and the President of Mexico, Miguel Aleman.
Following graduation from high school, Gutierrez joined the U.S. Army, serving in Korea first and later in the Pentagon, as an illustrator. When he was discharged from the Army, Gutierrez went to work for the next 15 years at the San Antonio Light newspaper as a political cartoonist and illustrator. In his spare time he pursued his interest in painting, sculpting, writing poetry, and songwriting, eventually focusing most of his creative talent as a painter in both watercolor and oil. Gutierrez’s paintings ultimately brought him to the attention of the Texas State Legislature, which named him Texas Artist of the Year for 1983-1984.
Given his impressive lifetime of creativity one might think his drive to create would be winding down, but that doesn’t seem likely to happen anytime soon. “I’m 84, but I still paint every day. I want to leave my art as my signature, something people will appreciate long after I’m gone,” says Raul Gutierrez.
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