(b. 1945) John Alexander is a world renowned artist whose works pays tribute to the rich tradition of painters throughout the history of art. His early works were primarily semi-abstract landscapes, and later, dense, expressionistic paintings. His more recent drawings and paintings include birds, plants and animals (often those native to Texas and the Southern Gulf Coast states), and satirical works of characters and masked figures representing the most dysfunctional members of society.

Alexander grew up in Beaumont where his only exposure to art as was a small collection of art books owned by his family. He had an innate gift for drawing and painting that was encouraged by his mother. His father’s contribution to his art career was to take him on frequent camping and fishing excursions in the swamps and bayous of southeast Texas. The East Texas landscape became Alexander’s inspiration and has provided lifelong visual references throughout his career. 

When Alexander’s father passed away in 1965, Lamar painting professor Jerry Newman became a mentor to the freshman art student pushing him to hone his skills in drawing and painting and introducing him to art history. Though Alexander learned to draw by copying works of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, he didn’t see art in a museum setting until he was 21 years old and had an opportunity to visit the Art Institute of Chicago.

Alexander received an art degree from Lamar in 1968 and an M.F.A. degree from SMU. He taught at the University of Houston in the 70s, along with sculptor James Surls. When his career began taking off with exhibits at Meredith Long Gallery and the Contemporary Art Museum in Houston, he moved to New York to expand his opportunities in the art world. Alexander still lives in New York, but retains his fondness for Southeast Texas. He enjoys returning at every opportunity, particularly to visit Lamar and to see the birds and wildlife at Cattail Marsh and High Island.

Alexander was awarded a Fellowship by the National Endowment for the Arts in 1981 and another by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Memorial Foundation in 1984. He had a major retrospective at the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston in 2007. His work is included in the permanent collections of the The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York; the Smithsonian American Art Museum in D.C.; the Museum of Contemporary Art in L.A.; the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston; the Dallas Museum of Art; and the Art Museum of Southeast Texas in Beaumont. In 2015, the painting studio in the Lamar art building was dedicated as The John Alexander Painting Studio.