Mexican American artist and sculptor Octavio Medellin (1907-1999)
was born in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. He came to the United States in 1920, his family escaping the bloody Mexican Revolution, settling in San Antonio, Texas. He went on to study at the San Antonio School of Art, the Chicago Art Institute, and the Guggenheim Museum.

In 1929 he embarked on a lengthy journey around Mexico, visiting the villages and absorbing native art and craft techniques. He returned to the U.S. in 1931 and three years later he and several other San Antonio artists opened La Villita Gallery.

Medellin went on to become a prolific and successful artist with works exhibited throughout Texas and the United States, including the New York’s 1939 World’s Fair and the MoMA.

Over the next thirty years, Medellin practiced and taught at a succession of prestigious Texas venues, including three years at the Witte Museum of Art and at La Villita, five years as a sculptor-in-residence at North Texas State College (now UNT), four years teaching art students from Southern Methodist University and 21 years teaching sculpture and ceramics at the Dallas Museum of Fine Arts when it was in Fair Park.

In 1964 Medellin moved to a studio at Mendocino Art Center in Mendocino, California and in 1966 was lured back to Texas by a group of artists to form the Medellin School of Sculpture at famed western artist Frank Reaugh’s former studio, El Sibil, where he taught all levels of students in numerous different media. The Medellin School of Sculpture was incorporated under the name of the Creative Arts Center of Dallas which operates today on a two-acre campus in East Dallas.

Inspired by the art of the Mayan and Toltec indigenous cultures of Mexico as well as American Modernism, Medellin influenced a great number of artists including Tomás Bustos, Gladys Gostin, Sherri King, Marty Ray, and others. Although Medellin passed away in Bandera Texas in 1999, his art and legacy are very much alive.

OCTAVIO MEDELLÍN & CAC FUN FACTS

Followers of renowned regional artist Frank Reaugh were able to lure CAC’s founder away from his teaching post the Dallas Museum of Art where he had taught for 21 years to start the Octavio Medellin School of Sculpture (now called the Creative Arts Center of Dallas) in Reaugh’s Oak Cliff studio known as “El Sibil”. The Frank Reaugh Art Club still meets in Oak Cliff to this day.
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Medellin participated in the war effort in WWII by fabricating and casting airplane parts in his studio.
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In a typical year, CAC students will use 12,000 pounds of clay, carve 1,000 pounds of stone and use at least 1,000 tubes of paint.
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Medellin was asked to create a commission for City Hall and towards the end of completion, the City decided to move the piece at which Medellin abruptly pulled the installation and was not paid as he felt he had created it for a specific area and the new location did not suffice for him.
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Spearhead by Public Art Manager Kay Kallos in 2013, the City of Dallas Office of Cultural Affairs, the City rescued and restored gigantic fused glass windows from a church in East Dallas that were about to be demolished. They are now located in the City Performance Hall and Love Field.
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Notable artists and students who studied under Medellin include Edith Baker, Tomás Bustos, Gladys Gostin, Judy Hearst, David Hickman, Sherry King, T.J. Mabrey, Robert G. Pollock and Marty Ray.
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Medellin developed a special way of fusing 24 karat gold and platinum to mosaic tiles that can be seen in the Millard Sheet’s mosaics that were rescued from the Mercantile Bank Building before it was demolished and are now located throughout the Joule Hotel in downtown Dallas, thanks to the owner of the hotel Tim Headington.
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CAC has been in its current location for more than 30 years and has helped established the Little Forest Hills area of East Dallas as an arts community. The Center has served on the White Rock Artists Studio Tour since its inception more than 25 years ago.
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Medellin brought on a teenager who was hanging around the Oak Cliff studio named Tomás Bustos to serve as an apprentice (and lawn mower) for many years. Bustos has become a notable artist doing many public art pieces, including The Vaquerro, a monument located in the Fort Worth Stockyards completed with David Newton in 2012.

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