Cesar Santos, Young Versed, oil, 14 x 14.
By Bonnie Gangelhoff
ART EDUCATION: I started studying art at a very young age. I also watched my uncle, Santos Zerpa, who was a prominent Cuban artist, painting in his studio. Later I was accepted into a magnet high school for design and architecture. Then I was offered a scholarship to study at the New World School of the Arts, a college in Miami. After my fourth year I decided to quit to study art in Florence, Italy, where I spent two years learning the traditional ways of painting.
STYLE: It’s kind of “neo-academic.” I aspire to show images that transmit the impression of paintings of the past, but that are also imbued with contemporary, fresh concepts.
SECOND-CHOICE CAREER: I’ve always been versatile and good at academics and sports. Last year, while teaching art in Stockholm, I won the gold medal at the Angered Centrum Box Cup. So maybe I would be a boxer.
BEST ADVICE RECEIVED: I’ve always been surrounded by great people with lots of great advice but I stopped taking it all after one incident. Everyone told me to stop boxing because I might destroy my gifted hands. I finally listened, only to break my wrist falling from a ladder in my own studio.
FUTURE GOALS: My ultimate goal is to become a part of art history and have my paintings illustrated in art history books.
PRICE RANGE: $3,000 to $30,000.
REPRESENTATION: Greenhouse Gallery of Fine Art, San Antonio, TX; Cavalier Galleries, Greenwich, CT; Cremata Fine Art, Miami, FL; www.santocesar.com.
Featured in our annual “21 Under 31” issue in September 2010