Luis Alvarez Roure was born on January 14, 1976, in Arecibo, Puerto Rico. At an early age, he found his passion for representational art, teaching himself to do meticulous realist drawings of people. Even though his parents encouraged him to take art lessons, he declined it, fearing that it could make him lose interest. He also had a great appetite for music and his father enrolled him in piano lessons, so he could develop his musical skills. The discipline and involvement his musical studies required outweighed the practice of the visual arts, causing him to abandon drawing almost completely and have music become his choice for a career.
In 2000, Luis moved to New York City to complete his Master’s Degree in music with the renowned Cuban-American pedagogue Germán Diez Nieto (1924-2014). While he was a graduate student, Luis enrolled at the Art Students League of New York where he studied with the late master Nelson Shanks (1937-2015). Because of his music studies, the time at the League was very irregular and he couldn’t dedicate himself on a full-time basis. However, this experience was a key point for his development as an artist, offering him a strong sense of direction.
In 2018, Peter Trippi, Editor in Chief of Fine Art Connoisseur Magazine described Roure's virtuosity in two strengths. "First, he has perfected his draftsmanship through constant sketching of tonal studies taken directly from the paintings of past masters... Roure's second strength is the empathy he so evidently feels with his sitters. Their expressions and posses convey the sense of life that comes not only through observation but also through an intuitive connection between people..."
-Fine Art Connoisseur, December 2018
Mr. Roure is a figurative and still-life painter better known for his portraits of internationally known figures such as Philip Glass, Joshua Bell, Steven Isserlis, Larisa Martínez, Paul Volcker, Cándido Camero, and Octavio Vázquez Rodríguez.
In 2019 he was a finalist at the Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition with his painting "Hidden Wounds", included in the exhibition The Outwin 2019: American Portraiture Today held at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery. The same year his portrait of Philip Glass was part of the prestigious Recent Acquisitions exhibition also at the Smithsonian.
In 2020 The National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. acquired the portrait of the virtuoso violinist Joshua Bell for their permanent collection, making this, along with the portrait of Philip Glass, his second painting to be acquired by the Smithsonian Institution. Other important American and European institutions to own Roure's work include The Museu Europeu d'Art Modern (MEAM) in Barcelona, Spain; The Federal Reserve in Washington D.C; The Steinway Hall in New York City and the Warren County Courthouse in Warren, P.A.
His work has appeared in major publications such as Los Angeles Times, Fine Art Connoisseur Magazine, American Art Collector Magazine, The Outwin 2019 catalog, Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery's "What's On", MEAM Catalog of Works, Vanity Fair, Downbeat Magazine, American Artist Drawing Magazine, Piano Lessons With Claudio Arrau and the Art Renewal Center Catalog Raisonné among others. He has also been interviewed by Puerto Rico's leading newspaper El Nuevo Día and for NBC News television segment "Visiones" and YouTube artist's interview program "Desde el Arte".
* This statement has been provided directly by the artist in association to their 14th International ARC Salon entries. This content has not been edited for typos or grammatical errors and has not been vetted for accuracy.
