Eluid Martinez New Mexico Folk Art

Eluid Levi Martinez was born in 1944 in the Hispanic Northern 

New Mexico mountain village of Cordova. He is a member of the 

famous Lopez wood carving family from that village, A family which has 

produced Santos for 7 generations. 

A self-taught artist he began to carve Santos in the late 1960s. In 

the early 1970s he started doing charcoal drawings of western animals. 

Prints of three of those animal drawings are in the collections of the Autry museum of the American West. In the early 1980s he started 

doing oil paintings and watercolors of the Northern New Mexico 

landscape.

 In the early 1990s he produced lithographs at the Tamarind 

Lithographic  Institute. His lithographs are in the collections of the 

Smithsonian's  American Art Museum and the Autry Museum of the American West.

Museums's featuring his sculptures in their permanent collections 

include the Smithsonian's  American Art Museum and its National 

Museum of American History, the Denver Art Museum, the American 

Folk Art Museum, the New Mexico Museum of International Folk 

Art, the Taylor Museum of the Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, the Millicent Roger's Museum, and the Roswell Fine Arts Center.

The Museum of the National Hispanic Cultural Center recently 

included one of his watercolors in it's collections. 

Since the early 1970s Eluid's Santo sculptures have been part of 

numerous museum exhibitions including the Smithsonian's American Art Museum's 2001 touring exhibition "Treasures of American Folk Art". 

The American Folk Art Society at its 2018 annual meeting  presented 

Eluid with an Artist Award of Distinction.

During the past couple of years Eluid has concentrated on producing oil paintings and charcoal drawings which depict the vistas and activities that he experienced growing up in northern New Mexico. 

His oil paintings have been compared as conveying a feeling for the northern new Mexico landscape similar to that captured by Georgia 

O'keef.

Eluid's "Santo" wood sculptures and small animals are carved from Aspen wood.  His uses are oils, acrylics, and watercolors in his paintings.  He uses Pencil and charcoal in his drawings.  

Eluid's Sculptures and carvings are inspired by his family's rich artistic heritage.  His paintings and drawings are inspired by the northern New Mexico landscape and his memories of his early years growing up in the Village of Cordova, New Mexico.