Carlos’ abstractions present spectators with a complex visual language full of expression, color, and motion. Sometimes minimalistic and other times complex networks of shapes and lines create vibrant canvases buzzing with his signature mark.

Born in 1958, he participated in the GLCA Apprenticeship program in 1979 (now called the AICAD / New York Studio Residency Program), assisting NYC artists Robert Stackhouse and Louis Liberman. He graduated from DePauw University in 1980 with a Liberal Arts Degree.

Though he is widely recognized as a painter and sculptor, throughout his career he has also worked as a Graphic Designer, Illustrator, Art Director, and Creative Director, which has given him an eye for what is current. As an artist, he exhibited four solo shows at Galleria Luigi Marrozzini until the mid-1990s, which were pivotal in his career, positioning him as a creative force within the local art scene.

During this period, Carlos was selected for the traveling exhibit, “New Art from Puerto Rico,” organized by the Springfield Art Museum in Massachusetts and curated by Susana Torruella. In 1994, he took part in the Caribbean Painting Biennial at Museo de Arte Moderno in Santo Domingo. Also that year, his works were included in “Yslas: Art in Transit,” presented at Hostos Community College, Bronx, NY.

He became a painting professor at the Escuela de Artes Plásticas in San Juan for two years in the late 1990s and later, in 2001, exhibited his “No Boundaries: a 20-year Survey” at the Museo de Ballaja in Old San Juan, curated by Nilda Peraza (Director at Cayman Gallery, NYC). In 2004, Carlos was part of the traveling exhibit “Puerto Rican Art: Image of a Culture,” presented at the Orlando Museum of Art in Florida. In May 2012, he exhibited a mid-career survey, “Only Essence Remains,” also held at the Museo de Ballaja, curated by William Stover (Curator at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston).

His work is included in major private and public collections around the world, including the Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico (MAPR), the Ponce Museum, the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de PR (MAC), and the New York Federal Reserve Bank, NYC. In recent years, he has participated in various international art fairs, including Red Dot, Circa, Scope, the Armory Show, and PhotoMiami.

His body of work oscillates between colorful abstractions loaded with intricate markings and bold representational works that are keen, almost satirical observations of social issues found in his native Puerto Rico, where he expresses his acute vernacular in vivid colors.

In 2018, he presented “Aftermath,” a personal view of the issues the island faced after Hurricane Maria. In 2020, which proved to be one of his most productive years, he exhibited his perspective on the COVID Pandemic in “Lockdown Paintings,” a series of large-scale paintings that reflect his experience, thoughts, and comments during those highly medically-political times. In 2020, Carlos was part of the “Art in U.S. Embassies Program” in Kolonia, Federated States of Micronesia. In 2023, he presented “Caribbean Soul” at the Puerto Rico Tourism Co. in San Juan.

As an established artist, he has a quiet, resolute approach, while rendering bold and remarkable modernist strokes of his genius. To divide his work into social commentary through figuration and complex abstract language is to be reductive, as his work is a complex visual language full of expression, color, and motion.