Photo of Ignacio Ruiz-Pérez courtesy Instituto Tuxtleco de Arte y Cultura, ITAC.

On September 21, 2023, Ignacio Ruiz-Pérez received the prestigious 2023 Óscar Oliva Poetry Prize for his book Ensayo de la sombra [Essay on Shadow], a conceptual book based on Christopher Nolan’s film Memento. It is written in free verse and prose, and it presents a multiple, palimpsestic dialogue between the author and different Hispanic poets that share the oneiric and textual experience derived from altered emotional, poetic, personal and artistic states. This summer, Dr. Ruiz-Pérez was also invited to present his most recent book of poetry, El deseo es una lámpara que no alumbra [Desire is a lamp that does not shine], an intimate book about love, death, illness, and health, at the University of Veracruz, and at the Autonomous University of Tabasco. This book was the winner of the Autonomous University of Sinaloa National Poetry Prize in 2021. Dr. Ruiz-Pérez is the author of over ten books of poetry, including two volumes translated into English, and he is the recipient of numerous other awards, including the UTA Distinguished Record of Research/Creative Activity award (2019), the Horacio Zúniga National Poetry Prize (2018), and the Leon Felipe International Poetry Prize (2015), among others.