Alberto Gómez-Gómez was born in Bogotá, Colombia, on December 12, 1956, the second of seven children. His mother was Alicia Gómez-Gómez , and his father was Luis Horacio Gómez-Gómez . Alberto became a U.S. citizen on July 29, 2011, through the Individuals with Extraordinary Ability or Achievement Visa.
Education
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Alberto attended Escuela de Artes Plásticas (School of Fine Arts) at Universidad Distrital Francisco José de Caldas in Bogotá.
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He studied Liberal Arts, focusing on intellectual currents of the day such as aesthetics, politics, and the human condition. He frequently attended seminars by Latin American and International speakers and studied in the studio of the artist Jaime Castillo.
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After leaving Bogotá for Venezuela, Alberto continued his studies at Colegio Universitario de Caracas while working as a monitor and student of Manuél Reyes Navarro in Barquisimeto, Venezuela.
Alberto Gómez-Gómez is primarily known as a figurative artist, excelling in painting and printmaking. His large-scale murals in the United States and Colombia have garnered recognition nationwide.
Between 1975 and 1981, Gómez-Gómez worked as a freelance designer, typographer, illustrator, and graphic artist in Colombia and Venezuela. It was during this period that he developed an interest in painting large murals, starting in 1979.
His first solo exhibition took place in 1981 at the Ateneo Popular in Guanare, Venezuela. That same year, Gómez-Gómez returned to Bogotá, where he served as a Professor of Art History and fine art drawing for CIDCA for twelve years. Simultaneously, he taught classes at Universidad Pedagógica Nacional de Colombia on advanced color theory, textural representations in painting, anatomy, and painting techniques. In 1986, he conducted research on the History of Art in Colombia at the Archivo General de la Nación in Bogotá.
Since 1997, Alberto Gómez-Gómez has resided and worked in Deltona, Florida. He has held over 100 exhibitions in Colombia, Venezuela, and the United States. Throughout his 44-year career, Gómez-Gómez has gained acclaim for his murals, paintings, drawings, and printmaking editions exhibited across Latin America and the United States. His art is featured in many museums, major corporations, and private collections around the world.
Alberto Gómez-Gómez is married to Luz Stella Barrios Gómez and has four children, Oliver, Jean-Paul, Leonardo, and Shaía, as well as one grandchild, Yaiko.
Exhibitions
Alberto Gómez-Gómez 's work has been showcased in various prestigious institutions, including the Orlando Museum of Art, Ormond Memorial Art Museum and Gardens, DeLand Museum of Art, African American Museum of Art, ArtPrize in Grand Rapids, MI, NASA's John F. Kennedy Space Center, The Pentagon, and public places.
Selected Permanent Collections
His artwork is part of permanent collections in institutions and locations such as Volusia County Courthouse, The Daytona News-Journal, Daytona International Speedway NASCAR, Universidad Distrital in Bogotá, Colombia, and many other institutions across the United States and Latin America.
Awards
Throughout his career, Alberto Gómez-Gómez has received several awards, including The Artists’ Fellowship-New York Grant in 2007, an Individual Artist Professional Development Grant in DeLand, FL, in 2006, and a Department of State-Partners of the Americas Grant in 2001.
Exhibitions
Selected Solo and Group Exhibitions
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Orlando Museum of Art. Orlando, FL
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Ormond Memorial Art Museum and Gardens, Ormond Beach, FL
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DeLand Museum of Art. DeLand, FL
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African American Museum of Art. DeLand, FL
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ArtPrize. Grand Rapids, MI
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NASA. John F. Kennedy Space Center. Titusville, FL
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The Pentagon, Washington, DC
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The State Capitol, Tallahassee, FL
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Consulate of Colombia, Miami, FL and Orlando, FL
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Orange County Administration Center, Orlando, FL
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Orlando City Hall-Terrace Gallery. Orlando, FL
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Orlando City Hall-Mayor’s Gallery. Orlando, FL
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University of Central Florida. Orlando, FL
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Seaside Music Theater. Daytona Beach, FL
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South Daytona City Hall. South Daytona, FL
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City Arts Factory. Orlando, FL
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Artist’s Registry. Orlando, FL
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Osceola Center for the Arts. Kissimmee, FL
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Pioneers Settlement for the Arts. Barberville, FL
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Albertson-Peterson Gallery. Winter Park, FL
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Gallery 108. Miami, FL
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Ana G. Méndez University. Orlando, FL
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Deltona Arts & Historical
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Center. Deltona, FL
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Dr. And Mrs. Jose Carlos Cruz’s residence. Lubbock, TX
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Public Libraries: Volusia, Orange, Seminole and Osceola counties
Selected Permanent Collections
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Volusia County Courthouse. DeLand, FL
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The Daytona News-Journal. Daytona Beach, FL
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Partners of the Americas, Washington, D. C.
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Daytona International Speedway NASCAR. Daytona Beach, FL
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Universidad Distrital. Bogotá, Colombia
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San Andrés Hospital. San Andres Isla, Colombia
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Fish Memorial Hospital. DeLand, FL
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Boys and Girls Club. Grand Rapids, MI
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The Epiphany Catholic Church
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Elementary, Middle and High Schools from: Deltona, FL; DeLand, FL; Orlando, FL, Apopka, FL; Sanford, FL; Daytona Beach, FL
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Deltona Regional Library
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Hope Community Center, Apopka, FL
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The Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. Orlando, FL
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Daytona Beach, Juvenile Detention Center. Daytona Beach, FL
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National Dance Institute. Santa Fe, NM
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The American Cancer Society. Pinellas Park, FL
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Banco Popular. Orlando, FL
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Thomas C. Kelly Administration Center. DeLand, FL
Awards
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The Artists’ Fellowship-New York Grant. 2007
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Individual Artist Professional Development Grant. DeLand, FL. 2006
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Department of State-Partners of the Americas Grant. 2001
Reviews
Alberto Gómez is often likened to modern day Michelangelo. His countless paintings, murals, drawings and prints stand apart from other painters of this day, visually, but also with the stories they tell.
Gómez’s “truth” in life is love and loss combined with hope, faith and joy. He showcases this truth in his large-scale works, baring his soul over and over again, while giving us, his audience, a glimpse into our own lives as well.
Sometimes we hear lyrics from a particular song and wonder how the songwriter knew what we were going through. This is how it feels to look upon Alberto’s work.
Barbara Tiffany
Curator, Crealdé School of Art
Alberto Gómez is a living, working painter, printmaker and muralist. His story is, to grossly understate it, unusual. He has been a naturalized American citizen for fo years as of this writing in July, 2020. This is a worthy achievement, though nothing to compare with abandoning in 1997, an established and respected artistic career in Bogotá, Colombia, to forge a new path. He and his family flew to Miami, stayed briefly in West Palm, and settled into their home in Deltona. They had withstood what would be a volcanic eruption in anyone’s family life and managed it with grace.
Shortly after his arrival, Alberto was introduced to Tippen Davidson, the late publisher of The Daytona News Journal who would become a collector of Alberto’s work. A politically sophisticated, culturally enlightened man, Davidson’s support and promotion of Alberto Gómez would last a lifetime. The relationship was, of course, empowering; it freed Alberto to conduct a life in art in a suitably principled way.
Responsibility is an attitude that resounds in Alberto’s work. It is presented with clarity as for instance, in his depictions of children. That they interweave throughout his paintings as a recurring theme is obviously intentional. They appear in his work as fear and hope, creativity and wonder, and certainly, possibility and imagination. All of these potent characteristics of life are conveyed by their presence, without requiring them to be anything but children.
The same can be said of every human condition, each historical event, all of this artist’s visual essays, expositions, reflective musing – fancifully, every branch, twig and leaf one sees in his work declares its own existence to be indispensable. Alberto Gómez, for better and worse, presents the world to us, as he hopes will see it – it is as it is and as exact as he can make it and, inevitably, every message resolves as explosively joyous.
Alberto has returned recently to the panoramic format of mural painting. It was a feature of his early prominent work which began with his mural Caldas Tutelar, commissioned in Bogotá to commemorate the life of a much admired progenitor of higher education. Alberto has, over time, expanded its purview to provide for a means of cultural consciousness-raising. He is an urgent advocate for the lives of marginalized people and especially for children at risk. The mural allows him to elaborate on the distressing and the delightful in life, one topic at a time. The outcome benefits powerfully from his focused approach. Still, he declines to dwell on seemingly fashionable disillusionment, indifference to the disparities of cultural inclusion. In the art of Alberto Gómez, we still find incontrovertible certainty that affirmation can be the only way forward.
Richard Mark Johnson
Artist