Samuel E. Vázquez
Puerto Rican graffiti artist
Samuel E. Vázquez, styled as Samuel E Vázquez (born Samuel Enrique Vázquez Rivas, 1970), was a participant of the New York City Subway graffiti art movement of the 1980s. Today, Vázquez works on abstract expressionist paintings.
Life and career
Vázquez was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico, in 1970 to parents of African, Spanish, French, and Jewish descent. He learned to be disciplined from his father, who was in the military. His parents recognized his artistic inclination at the age of four and encouraged him to explore the arts. In 1979 the family moved to New York City where Samuel first became aware of the graffiti that covered the city's subways and walls. By 1983 Samuel began painting and writing the subways using the name "Brame." He is a member of numerous New York City graffiti crews. "He [Vázquez] was part of a generation that claimed their humanity by literally writing their own names on walls to keep from being dismissed." Vázquez was mentored by fellow graffiti artist Anthony "A-One" Clark, a collaborator of neo-expressionist painter Jean-Michel Basquiat. After the New York City subway graffiti era ended, Vázquez shifted his focus to furthering his education. He holds degrees from New York City College of Technology, part of the City University of New York (CUNY) system, and the Herron School of Art and Design, a division of Indiana University.
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This entry incorporates text from “Samuel E. Vázquez” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.