T HE T REASURE OF S AN E LIZARIO : N ATIVE S ANDERSON A RTIST
Story and photographs by David Stephens
A
lberto Escamilla is one of the
leading impressionist painters
in West Texas. He has paint-
ings hanging in collections from New
York to Austria to Japan. He is a long-
time friend of Cormac McCarthy, the
writer of The Road and No Country for
Old Men, who is a collector of
Escamilla’s work. McCarthy recently
commissioned him to paint a portrait
of Isaac Newton to hang in the Santa
Fe Institute. In 2004 Escamilla was
inducted into the El Paso Artist Hall of
Fame. A few days before I met with
him, he celebrated his 36th anniver-
sary of being a professional artist and
the fourth anniversary of opening his
gallery in the historic art district of San
Elizario, Texas.
The El Paso painter was born in
Sanderson, Texas. He dabbled in art
during high school, but the six-foot-
one Escamilla mostly focused on
sports. After graduating in 1962,
Escamilla’s options were limited: either
work on the railroad or get a job as a
laborer. Neither seemed appealing, so
when one of his athletic coaches told
him that the Texas Western basketball
coach in El Paso had invited him to try
out for the team, he accepted.
He made the team, and walking
from his dorm to the basketball gym he
would always notice the art students
drawing outside. One day he asked to
join. “I didn’t even know art was some-
thing you could study,” he says. He
remembers walking through rooms full
of easels, paints and empty canvases in
awe. At the end of his freshman year,
he left the basketball team for a spot in
the art school.
It wasn’t easy. Teachers would look
at his early efforts and ask him if he
had considered another major. It took
time to develop a feeling for what he
was doing. After graduating Escamilla
postponed the artistic life. He spent
several years abroad serving in the
army. After his service he returned to
El Paso for a job in advertising. Time
was hard to come by. “I thought, okay,
this is it. My artist’s life will be on the
weekends,” he says. But the easels and
18
Cenizo
colors kept calling,
and in 1977 he quit
his job to pursue
painting full time.
“That was very
hard because you
have a good job
and you just quit,”
Escamilla says. Not
long after, he was
calling up friends
asking them to buy
paintings so he
could pay his rent.
His work started
to gain momentum
when he met his
current
wife,
Rachel, who also
became his manag-
er. With her help
he was able to tap
into higher eche-
lons
of
the
American
art
world, and secured
some shows in New
York where he
caught the eye of
collectors.
He
describes
impressionism as
experimentation of
color. In true
impressionist style,
he likes subjects that
give him an oppor-
tunity to do just
that. “My true love
is the gardens,” he
says, motioning to a
compact painting
bursting with multi-
colored flora.
It’s oddly coun-
terintuitive. The
West Texas deserts
don’t seem imme-
diately conducive
to his desired sub-
ject matter. When I asked him how the
landscape affected his work, he point-
ed to a famous painting of his called “A
Trip to my Grandmother’s.” It is an
Third Quarter 2014
example of his early, stripped-away
impressionism. The painting is strik-
ing, accomplished with only a few col-
ors portraying a windswept desert
landscape, and some
dark figures, their backs
to the viewer, walking
into it.
“My palate is much
more limited,” he says.
“That’s why my paint-
ings in New York were
successful. They were
different, and that was
exciting.” His desire to
continue in the tradition
of the impressionists and
the experimentation of
color has become the
focus of his work. His
gallery represents a vast
range of subjects and col-
ors, and he speaks excit-
edly about the possibility
of painting the blue bon-
net flower blooming this
year.
He applies paint in
quick staccato dabs, as
opposed to traditional
sweeping
brushwork.
This technique gives his
work a remarkable tex-
ture, but almost 40 years
of painting took a toll on
a nerve in his elbow.
Seven years ago his hand
gave out. “It’s wear and
tear,” he says. His paint-
ings were always large,
but since the injury he’s
made some changes. No
commission deadlines,
no more massive canvas-
es. A quieter pace.
Four years ago he
moved to San Elizario and
opened a gallery. A small,
unvarnished community,
it’s a place where you
wouldn’t
normally
encounter fine art and
that’s exactly the idea.
“People would come to me
and say ‘I feel so bad for you, now that
you’re here.’
But I feel so
honored,” he continued on page 26