46 Facts About Baruj Salinas

Baruj Salinas was a Cuban-American contemporary visual artist and architect.

Baruj Salinas is recognized as a central figure in the establishment of the modern Latin American art market in South Florida.

Baruj Salinas's ancestors came from a small salt mining town in northern Spain and they derive their name from these origins with "sal" meaning salt in Spanish.

Baruj Salinas began painting early in life and was influenced and supported in the arts by his mother.

Baruj Salinas would draw and sketch, such as tracing newspaper comics.

Baruj Salinas's mother encouraged his progression as a self-taught artist and he continued developing in this way until he received a scholarship to study painting in Kent State University.

Baruj Salinas's subjects were largely his friends and their family and they continued in his early realist vein.

Baruj Salinas later admitted that in these commissions he would idealize his subject's likeness for a more flattering representation and overall did not enjoy painting portraits.

Baruj Salinas began to explore facades and structures and gradually dabble into abstraction, which would become his most identifiable style later in his career.

Baruj Salinas began by depicting buildings around him in America and eventually delved into depicting imagined buildings, which would take him further into three dimensional representation and the conceptual.

Baruj Salinas had the advantage of being already fluent in English by that point, but still struggled economically as most early exiles had, particularly in the arts.

Baruj Salinas's artwork continued his self-imposed evolution away from architectural influences and saw him directly embrace abstraction for the first time.

Baruj Salinas drew inspiration from the Space Race and Apollo 13 and painted pieces inspired by outer space and astronomy, such as nebulas and constellations.

Baruj Salinas was increasingly active in the Cuban and Latin American art market in Miami.

In 1968, Baruj Salinas won a First Prize award for Watercolor from the Fort Lauderdale Museum of Art.

In 1969 he received the Cintas Fellowship for art and then for a second time in 1970, which Baruj Salinas has credited in interviews with giving him the initiative to ultimately quit architecture as his main profession and fully dedicate himself to fine art in the 1970s.

Baruj Salinas introduced Gonzalez to Jesus and Marta Permuy, in 1969.

In 1974, Baruj Salinas relocated from Miami to Barcelona, Spain where he would remain for the following two decades.

In Spain, Baruj Salinas became associated with leading art dealer Juana Mordo, who was an essential contact for Baruj Salinas and opened her vast network to him within Madrid and Barcelona.

Baruj Salinas became associated with prominent Spanish painters, including Joan Miro, Antoni Tapies, as well as American Alexander Calder.

Baruj Salinas became immersed in Spain's literary community and developed close friendships with several writers including Maria Zambrano, Jose Angel Valente, Vahe Godel, Ramon Dachs, Pere Gimferrer, and Michel Butor.

In 1980 Baruj Salinas partnered with Jose Angel Valente on Tres lecciones de Tinieblas, a book inspired by the Jewish mysticism of the Kabbalah and utilized fourteen Hebrew letters along with Valente's poetic interpretation of each.

Baruj Salinas did two books with Maria Zambrano, one of which, Antes de la ocultacion: los mares, was noteworthy for its four lithographs by Salinas that involved a complex double process: the first being the lithographic process while the second was the incorporation of texture into the book.

In 1988 Baruj Salinas worked with Michel Butor on the book Trois enfants dans la fournaise.

The book featured etchings by Baruj Salinas and accompanying poetry by Butor and was shown in the Museum of Bayeux in France.

Baruj Salinas established long-running creative relationships with Barcelona printmakers and artists.

Baruj Salinas worked with Japanese artist and printmaker Masafumi Yamamoto for 15 years, during which time Salinas refined his own printmaking processes.

Baruj Salinas returned to Miami in 1992 and would reside in Coral Gables, Florida.

Baruj Salinas attributed the widening of his color palette and increased use of contrast and saturation to the difference in light between Spain and Miami, as well as the cultural differences between how each city uses color.

Baruj Salinas was a fine art professor at Miami Dade College and began teaching in the MDC Interamerican campus in 2001.

From 2015 to 2017 Baruj Salinas was recruited to be part of The Torah Project which was then compiled in the book The Torah Project Humash.

Baruj Salinas died in Coral Gables, Florida, on August 18,2024, at the age of 89.

Baruj Salinas' art is noted for its spiritual, philosophical, cultural, and symbolic layerings.

Baruj Salinas is identified with the Abstract Expressionism movement, having first been exposed to the work of its leading members while at Kent State University.

Baruj Salinas has occasionally taken to forays of figurative and representational abstraction.

Baruj Salinas's art is noted for its collaborative nature and the occasional influence of other artists.

Baruj Salinas described abstract painters Albert Rafols Casamada and Tapies as influences on his work in Barcelona and considered Miro a mentor while maintaining that they each had differing styles and approaches.

Baruj Salinas described color as a key acknowledgment of his Cuban identity.

Key Jewish-inspired series' of Baruj Salinas work include his award-winning collaboration with Jose Angel Valente, Tres Lecciones de Tinieblas, as well as his paintings for the Torah Project in 2015.

Baruj Salinas has had over 100 solo exhibitions of his artwork and has exhibited in over 20 countries throughout Europe, Asia, Africa, and the Americas.

Baruj Salinas has been covered by several media outlets, including Art Now, Arte Al Dia Internacional Magazine, Art in America, Art News, The Washington Post, The Miami Herald and El Nuevo Herald.

Baruj Salinas's artwork has been discussed and featured on several books of Contemporary American art, Cuban, Latin American, and Jewish art.

Baruj Salinas was the subject of the book BARUJ SALINAS, first published in Spanish in 1979 and republished in 1988, when it was translated into English and French.

Baruj Salinas' artwork has been sold on fine art brokerage institutions including Sotheby's, Artnet, and others.

In 2021, Baruj Salinas was awarded the 2021 Premio Amelia Pelaez by the Cuban Cultural Center of New York.

Baruj Salinas' work is featured in several international fine art collections including:.