About

JOSH GALLEGOS

Artist | Painter | Creative Technologist

Growing up between Santa Fe, New Mexico and the Bay Area, I learned early on how place shapes identity. As a Hispanic artist shaped by both New Mexican roots and California influences, my work carries the contrasts that defined my childhood—movement and transition, belonging and displacement, chaos and creativity. Born in Houston and raised in Santa Fe before I could walk, my earliest memories are of drawing at two or three years old, and by thirteen I was selling my first pieces.

Art first became real to me through family. My stepbrothers and cousins were endlessly creative—musicians, illustrators, naturally funny people who made art simply because they loved it. On the other side of my family, my second cousin Arlene Sisneros, a renowned New Mexican retablo artist, introduced me to a world where art was a life. Walking through her home, seeing the work she created and traded with friends across Santa Fe, gave me a glimpse of a future I wanted: one where art and community intertwined.

Growing up in a big New Mexican Hispanic family—my father one of 17 children, and me one of four boys—life was full of movement. After my parents divorced, I alternated living between New Mexico and California almost every year, while my older brothers stayed in Santa Fe. Those years shaped me profoundly. Constant change taught me how relationships shift depending on where you are, how people see you, and how finding a sense of home can be both grounding and elusive. These themes—belonging, dreams, identity, mental health—continue to anchor my paintings to this day.

I’m a self-taught artist, though I was lucky to cross paths with people who saw something in me. My high school teacher Sandy Wright encouraged me to paint beyond the classroom walls. Later, Southwestern abstract painter CiCi Reese gave me early professional advice that stuck with me. Artist influences ranging from Picasso, Dalí, Rivera, Miró, and O’Keeffe to musicians like Jeff Buckley and Chris Cornell helped shape the emotional and surreal qualities of my work.

Alongside painting, I carved an unexpected path through technology. After receiving academic scholarships and beginning college two years ahead through AP credits, I studied engineering and business at New Mexico State University. Money was tight, so I taught myself to build websites to sell my art and eventually launched my own creative company, Symphonic Soul. Over the last 15 years, that work grew into a full-spectrum creative practice: web development, custom software tools, interactive art modules, AI-driven projects, and client work ranging from startups to wellness platforms and fine artists.

My art and my software work have always evolved together. Today, I paint primarily in acrylic, charcoal, and pastel, while building interactive digital tools that allow people to create art through motion, voice, and shared experiences. These tools expand access to creativity—turning spectators into collaborators, and connecting people in new ways.

Now based in Denver, Colorado, I’m focused on bringing my own artistic voice forward: sharing my work, connecting with people online, and exploring new combinations of painting, culture, technology, and storytelling. At the center of everything I create is the desire to understand where we come from, what shapes us, and how creativity helps us navigate the complexities of belonging and being human.

ARTIST STATEMENT

My work explores the emotional landscapes that form between identity, memory, and belonging. As a Hispanic artist shaped by both New Mexican heritage and the shifting environments of my childhood, I create paintings that navigate the tension between where we come from and who we become. Moving often between New Mexico and California taught me how fluid identity can be—how a person changes with each place they inhabit, and how the search for home becomes an inner journey as much as a physical one.

These experiences surface in my paintings through layered abstractions, surreal imagery, and dreamlike symbolism. I’m drawn to the subconscious: the way dreams hold truths we don’t always have language for, and how emotional memory reveals itself through color, shape, and texture. Themes of cultural belonging, mental health, spiritual grounding, and the quiet spaces inside relationships guide much of my work. Animals, music, and fragments of the natural world often appear as emotional anchors—familiar symbols that carry warmth, humor, and intuition.

While my foundation is in acrylic, charcoal, and pastel, my practice extends into digital experimentation and interactive art. I build tools that translate movement, voice, and emotion into visual form, inviting anyone—regardless of background or skill—to become part of the creative process. These tools reflect my belief that art is not a solitary act; it’s a shared experience, a way of connecting people to themselves and to each other.

Whether through a hand-painted work or a collaborative digital piece, my goal is to create spaces where viewers can encounter their own stories—where identity feels expansive, where the subconscious feels safe to surface, and where creativity becomes a bridge to connection. My art is ultimately about the ongoing search for home: the internal place where memory, culture, and imagination converge.