Luis Jimenez | Progress Suite, 1976

Luis Jimenez Jr. an American sculptor of Mexican descent, was born in El Paso, Texas, in 1940. He studied art and architecture at the University of Texas in Austin and in El Paso, earning a bachelor's degree in 1964. He moved to New York City in 1966 after completing his postgraduate work at Ciudad Universitaria in Mexico City and moved to Hondo, New Mexico in 1971, where he lived and worked until his death in 2006. Jimenez grew up in El Paso as he said a Chicano before it was a militant term. His father and grandmother on one side and grandparents on his mother's side came to El Paso poor from Mexico. His father eventually owned a sign shop and Luis Jimenez worked in it from the time he was a small boy. His father taught him about paint, fiberglass, neon, and building molds, all of which Luis used later in his life in making his painted fiberglass sculptures. He was also very influenced by the low rider culture. He had a natural affinity for drawing and later learned about printmaking. He became an accomplished artist and later taught at the University of Arizona and the University of Houston. He was one of the first Chicano artists to be recognized nationally and internationally. He became known from his large polychrome and fiberglass sculptures, usually of Hispanic and Southwestern themes. His works were always controversial and eminently recognizable because of their themes and the bright, undulating surfaces. Progress, which is included in The Lancaster Hotel Collection, is exemplary of his fine skills and lithography. It is a suite of four prints, edition of 50, made in 1976 at Little Egypt Enterprises, a print workshop in Houston owned by master printer David Folkman, who worked with Jimenez in making this suite of lithographs. The word Progress is spelled out in the skies of the four prints. The image depicts Man's progress from Indian on horseback to a cowboy roping a steer, to stagecoach, to a train and car. All of them reveal Luis Jimenez's vivid use of color and robust figurative drawing. Luis Jimenez was well recognized for his talents during his lifetime and after his death. His work was collected by major museums throughout the country. One of the most famous is Vaquero which greets visitors at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.