Enrique Liborio Ruiz was born in Manila in 1903 and attended Manilla High School, before transferring to the Far Eastern College, Manilla, where he graduated in 1923. Whilst still in school, he attended evening classes at the School of Fine Arts, at the University of the Philippines, studying under renowned artists including Vicente Rivera, Fernando Amorsolo and I.L. Miranda. After completing school, Ruiz was determined to study in the US and was persuaded by his parents to study business at New York University. After a dismal first year, in which he reputedly failed every subject except economics, he was permitted to transfer to a Bachelor of Fine Arts course at Yale. During his studies he was employed by the prominent muralist Ezra Winter (1886-1959) and gained experience of stained-glass design with the firm of Emil Zundel, in New York. Before graduating in 1929, Ruiz had also met Juan M. Arellano (1888-1960), the Supervising Architect for the Philippines’ Bureau of Public Works, who was on study leave in the US at the time. It appears that Arellano introduced Ruiz to Javanese art and he subsequently produced a number of large-scale paintings heavily influenced by this style – one of which was spotted in the Yale University gallery and resulted in a commission from a Connecticut millionaire. Another of his paintings was exhibited in New York’s Grand Central Galleries in 1929. After travelling extensively through Europe, Ruiz returned to the Philippines in January 1930 and was celebrated by an extensive article in the June issue of Philippine Magazine, which also featured one of his paintings on the cover. That same year, Ruiz employed by Arellano (by then the Chief Consulting Architect at the Bureau of Public Works), who set him the task of designing murals for a number of public buildings. It appears that Ruiz fairly quickly moved into private practice as an artist, contributing mural works to the Art Deco University Theater, on Taft Avenue, Manilla, the refurbishment of the grand Manilla Hotel from the mid 1930s and the Times Theater, Quezon Avenue, Manilla. He is also recorded as having designed a mural for the Malacanan Palace, official residence of the Philippine President. Alongside his practice Ruiz, was active the educational field and was listed amongst the Faculty when the Philippine College of Design opened in 1941. Indeed, Ruiz’ decision to attend the Architectural Association’s Department of Tropical Architecture course, in London, from 1959-60, was likely a contributing factor for his appointment as the Dean of the College of Architecture and the Fine Arts, at the University of the Philippines, in 1962.
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