Career
Foreign most of his life, Salazar has been working as a farmer, painter, and teacher. His primary medium is papel amate, a folk craft tradition that the Nahuatls have used for over two millennia. The painting style takes its name from the medium that is used – “papel amate”, paper that is made from the bark of the ficus tree.
Salazar is one of the most highly respected traditional bark painters in the State of Oaxaca.
In a highly distinctive style, he depicts the sights and sounds of his home village through sophisticated compositions and juxtapositions of color. Though unschooled in any formal setting, Abraham Salazar has studied art and executes pastoral scenes of Mexican campesino (peasant) life that are outstanding examples of the form.
While many in the tradition never became known for their works, Salazar was the subject of a seminal (now out-of-print) book on the high-quality papel amate paintings of the Nahuatl. 2006 "The African Presence in México: From Yanga to the Present" National Museum of Mexican Art 2001 "Multiplicity: Prints from the Permanent Collection" 1999 "¡Provecho! A Taste of the Permanent Collection".