José Lerma was born in 1971 in Seville, Spain and grew up in Puerto Rico. He was recently named Chair of the Painting Department at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His solo exhibitions include Kemper Museum of Art, Andrea Rosen Gallery, Galería Roberto Paradise, Galerie Xavier Hufkens, Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, Green Gallery, Gallery Loock, Galería Marta Cervera, Contemporary Art Museum in Raleigh, NC, Arario Gallery in Seoul and Galleria Il Capricorno in Venice, Italy.

He has shown in group exhibitions at Lehman Maupin Gallery, the Milwaukee Art Museum, Institute Valecia d’art Modern in Spain, Innova, Museo de arte de Ponce, Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno, Deste Foundation for Contemporary Art, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit, Museo del Barrio, Josh Lilley Gallery, Ziher Smith Gallery in NYC, Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Ex-Teresa in Mexico City, and Loyal in Stockholm. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Art Forum, Time Out NY, The L Magazine, Die Welt, ABC and Flash Art. He attended the CORE program in Houston, amd the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. Collections include Saatchi Collection, London; MFA Houston; Milwaukee Art Museum, Wisconsin; Aby Rosen, New York; Chazen Museum of Art, Wisconsin; de la Cruz Collection; Arario Collection, South Korea; Phillip Isles, New York; Dakkis Joannou, Greece; Colección VAC, Spain.

Founded in 2011 by Francisco Rovira Rullán, ROBERTO PARADISE is referenced in art circles as a trailblazer, bolstering the reputations of its artists internationally; Rovira Rullán is one of the new wave of professional gallerists with art historical backgrounds, primarily concerned with cultural propagation. Since February 2014, ROBERTO PARADISE is a member of the New Art Dealers Alliance.

Since its inception, ROBERTO PARADISE has aggressively participated in the art fair circuit including Art Cologne, Dallas Art Fair, NADA Miami (three years in a row), ARCOmadrid, NADA NY (four years in row), Material Mexico (two years in a row), Expo Chicago (three years in a row), among others; cultivated transnational relationships with galleries like Andrea Rosen (NY), Josh Lilley (London) and ltd los angeles (LA) and amassed an impressive amount of press: Huffington Post, Flash Art, NY Times, Guggenheim Blogs, El País, LATimes, Modern Painters, DAZED, Art Review, Artnet, CNN, Sculpture Magazine, ABC, Artnews and Artforum, just to name a few.

Furthermore, a selection of ROBERTO PARADISE’s trajectory was featured in Phaidon’s “Art Cities of the Future: Contemporary Avant-Gardes” (2013). Museum exhibitions of his artitsts include: MCA Chicago, MOCAD Detroit, Sala Siqueiros México, Whitney Museum NY, Sculpture Center NY, Kemper Museum and MCA Santa Barbara, among others.

Just last year, ROBERTO PARADISE inaugurated Maid’s Room, the gallery’s new project space. Maid’s Room opens only at night.