Carlos Almaraz was born in Mexico City in 1941, and spent his youth in Los Angeles, California, and Chicago, Illinois. He attended the University of California, Los Angeles, and earned a Master's Degree at the Otis Art Institute in 1974.

Almaraz formed a group called Los Four with fellow artists Gilbert Lujan, Frank Romero, and Roberto de la Roche, and together they brought Chicano street art to the attention of the Los Angeles community. He created murals and other artwork for three years in support of Ceasar Chavez and the United Farmworkers Union. He was famous for painting a large mural, Boycott Gallo, on the All Nations Center in Los Angeles in the 1980s.

He is known for his paintings, pastels, and murals, often depicting city and street scenes. He has exhibited at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (1974) and participated in many group and solo-exhibitions.


2004
Chicano Visions - American Painters On The Verge
Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego - MCASD La Jolla, La Jolla, CA

2002
Arte Latin -: Treasures from the Smithsonian American Art Museum
Oakland Museum of California, Oakland, CA

2000
East of the River - Chicano Art Collestors Anonymos
Santa Monica Museum of Art, Santa Monica, CA

1998
Hannah Höch, Mit Pinsel, Feder und Schere
Galerie Remmert und Barth, Duesseldorf

Sources include:
American Artist, February 2001
Donna Stein, Between Reality and Abstraction
Artfacts.net