LewAllen Galleries presents Radiance of the anonymous, an exhibition of renowned Santa Fe artist Elias Rivera’s (1937-2019) masterful portraits in oil. The artist’s lush, warm colors, radiant light, and narrative compositions, distinguish Rivera’s work from his contemporaries. These portraits, intimate and vividly chromatic, show Rivera’s reverence for his subjects.

Born in the Bronx, NY, Elias Rivera began his career painting the city in which he was born. His New York works, set in crowded subway cars and dimly lit waiting rooms, stand in stark contrast to the vibrant paintings from Rivera’s Santa Fe years. Rivera’s career bloomed when he moved to Santa Fe and began travelling through and painting the peoples of Central and South America. His works feature the human figure as the singular focus of each painting. Each painting capturing the minute details of daily life in Latin American villages which exist as they had generations ago. The figures’ traditional garb, identical to their ancestors’, shine in Rivera’s golden luster. Rivera’s paintings show the world, and its people, as he saw it, without embellishment.

This exhibition highlights the multitude of portraits and narrative paintings Rivera produced over the course of his travels through Oaxaca, Guatemala, Mexico, and Peru.

Driven by the urge to “paint the theater of life”, Rivera depicts market vendors, mothers, and children as they go about their lives, seemingly unaware of the artist’s presence.

In his portraits viewers can see Rivera’s technical virtuosity at its best. Though the human figure remains at the heart of Rivera’s paintings, light plays an equally significant role. Like the works of Caravaggio, an artist Rivera has been likened to, light becomes a character in Rivera’s works. This radiance foregrounds ordinary people, elevating even the simple act of living. Illuminated by an otherworldly glow, Rivera’s figures spring out of the canvas and reveal his love for the cultures and people of Latin America.

In 2004, Rivera received the prestigious New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts. A major monograph entitled Elias Rivera was published in 2006 with an essay by well-known art critic and writer Edward Lucie-Smith.