Alcides Calizaya

Alcides Calizaya´s works contain a strong symbolic charge that invites to the deconstruction of reality, beauty, and the aesthetic experience.

He was born in the mining district of Miraflores, in northern Potosí, and studied plastic arts and anthropology in the city of Oruro. He has also been a book illustrator and a political cartoonist for a local newspaper in Llallagua, Potosí.

His drawings often blend indigenous with classical elements to construct pungent critiques of society and the stereotypes of western culture, through a careful use of traditional pen and ink drawing techniques. 

Throughout his career he has received multiple awards for his drawings and paintings, among them the First Place in Drawing at the National Plastic and Visual Arts Contest “Saint Philip of Austria" awarded by the City of Oruro, in 2017; and prior to this, in 2015, he was elected by his fellow plastic artists from Oruro as “Painter of the Year". 

He has participated of more than fifty collective shows and has put up five individual shows since 2001.