Architectural Expressionist Painting, "Forgotten Villages"

"Hola, I'm José Joaquín Ramos Alarcón and I was born in Catacaos on December 8, 1969. In 1990, I began to study art in the Escuela Superior de Arte de Piura. I had always heard my family talk about our customs and ancestral legends, and I looked for ways to depict them so that they'd live on just as they still live in my memories. For this reason, I turned to the canvas.

"I was seeking the perspective of the future in very difficult years for the government. I wanted my paintings to represent what I was feeling but, at that moment, art was limited. I decided to drop out of school and went to Argentina to master my art.

"After many years of struggle, I was able to get papers to study there in the School of Fine Arts. I am proud to have graduated from the historic Argentine Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes 'Prilidiano Pueyrredon' in 2003. They wanted to close this marvelous institute but we students would not permit it.

"I eventually returned to Peru, for I never abandoned my country. In 2006, I came home to live as I search for my identity and roots.

"My greatest inspiration is woman, honoring my mother and all women, as God has given them great gifts. They are soft, tenderhearted and fill the world with love. Women are an elemental factor of nature. My technique is principally that of abstraction based on a study of lines, forms, nuances and popular expressions with the unique feeling of our culture.

"For me, art is the most sublime and pleasant form of expression I could ever have encountered. It is my greatest satisfaction."

Ramos has participated in more than 50 exhibits in Peru and abroad, and has won a number of awards for his work.