Luis González Palma, a Guatemalan photographer born in 1957 in Guatemala City, initially trained as an architect and cinematographer. He turned to photography in the mid-1980s and quickly became a significant figure in contemporary Latin American art.

His evocative portraits, often sepia-toned and hand-painted, explore themes of identity, race, and history in Latin America, particularly the indigenous Maya and mestizo people of Guatemala. González Palma’s work is known for its emotional depth and symbolism, using intense gazes and theatrical costumes to evoke both the pain and dignity of his subjects.

He achieved early international recognition with his first major solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Hispanic Art in New York in 1989 and a breakthrough at Houston FotoFest in 1992. González Palma has exhibited at leading institutions worldwide, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Venice Biennale, and the Australian Centre for Photography. His works are in collections such as the Museum für Fotografie (Berlin), Maison Européenne de la Photographie (Paris), and Museo de Bellas Artes (Buenos Aires).

Since 2001, he has lived and worked in Córdoba, Argentina, expanding his photographic practice to include layered prints and symbolic materials. González Palma’s images have become internationally recognized for their poetic exploration of the gaze, memory, and cultural identity in postcolonial Latin America.

Walker printed for Luis in the early 2000s and reached out to him when starting Prints on Paper Studio to see if he wanted to publish with us. This is his first work printed in photogravure.