He was born in the small village of Ixtlahuaca and studied formally in the San Carlos Academy from 1911 to 1917, displaying his work in the XXVI Fine Arts Exhibition of 1921, and in a collective exhibition arranged by the New York's Drama Bookshop in 1925. He took an active part in the formation of the muralist movement, together with Fermín Revueltas, Ramón Alva de la Canal and Jean Charlot. It was from Charlot that he learned the fresco technique. He also worked with Carlos Mérida on two murals for the Ministry of Education, planning unfulfiled decoration about Iberoamerican integration for the Main Library. Together with Jean Charlot he became an enthusiastic promoter of Mexican lithography, revaluating 19th century subjects and techniques. After training in workshops in Cuba and the United States he returned to Mexico and in 1930 founded a school of lithography in what was then the Central School of Plastic Arts where his pupils included Carlos Orozco Romero, Julio Castellanos, Francisco Dosamantes and many others. In 1930, together with Francisco Díaz de León, he organized an important exhibition commemorating 100 years of Mexican lithography. A versatile artist, he also produced oils and watercolors -work he is less known for- and launched into photography and the cinema. In 1935, he successfully exhibited rayograms in the style of Moholy-Nagy in the Julien Levy's Gallery in New York. He lived in the United States for many years and was a teacher of graphic arts at the University of Oklahoma.
