{"id":246728,"date":"2026-04-12T20:30:23","date_gmt":"2026-04-12T20:30:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/246728\/"},"modified":"2026-04-12T20:30:23","modified_gmt":"2026-04-12T20:30:23","slug":"hal-marcus-celebrated-el-paso-artist-and-musician-dies-at-74","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/246728\/","title":{"rendered":"Hal Marcus, celebrated El Paso artist and musician, dies at 74"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" height=\"80\" width=\"80\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/cropped-Bob-Moore-1080-e1652998061514-80x80.jpg\" alt=\"Avatar photo\"\/> by\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/elpasomatters.org\/author\/robert-moore\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Robert Moore<\/a> <\/p>\n<p>April 12, 2026<\/p>\n<p>\ud83d\udce3\u00a0We use your feedback to strengthen our reporting. Tell us what\u2019s working and what\u2019s missing.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.surveymonkey.com\/r\/EPM2026Web\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Take our 2026 reader survey<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Hal Marcus, an artist, musician and promoter of the beauty of El Paso, died Sunday morning after a battle with cancer. He was 74.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOur beloved Hal Marcus passed into the next realm this morning at 4:39 a.m.,\u201d his daughter and business partner, Leilainia Marcus, said in a statement. \u201cHe will live in the hearts of everyone he met for eternity.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>We read every response. Your feedback helps us understand what information is most useful.<\/p>\n<p>Marcus was best known for his pop-surrealist paintings that captured life in the El Paso-Ju\u00e1rez border area. He also was a book illustrator, and in recent years had collaborated with author Luke Lowenfield on a series of children\u2019s books.<\/p>\n<p>For the past 30 years he operated the Hal Marcus Gallery. The gallery sold works by Marcus and other El Paso artists, many of whom he mentored.<\/p>\n<p>He also was a drummer for the bands Jitano and the Desert Prophets and Nuevo Huevo.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Funeral services will be at 10 a.m. Monday, April 13, at B\u2019nai Zion Cemetery, 3915 Gateway Blvd. West. Following the interment, family and friends are invited to a reception and ceremony to express condolences at the Sunset Parlor, 1307 N. Oregon St., El Paso, Texas 79902.<\/p>\n<p>In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made toward the establishment of the Hal Marcus Art Museum at 1319 N. Oregon, scheduled to open in late 2027. To donate, go to SunsetParlor.com.<\/p>\n<p>Survivors include his sisters, Shirleen Askenazi and Lillian Slovik, and brothers, Meyer Marcus and Clement Marcus; his first wife Judith Ann Marcus; his daughters; Leilainia and Nicole Adelaide; his son, Marco; and his wife of 25 years, Patricia Medici.<\/p>\n<p>This is a developing story and will be updated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"by\u00a0Robert Moore April 12, 2026 \ud83d\udce3\u00a0We use your feedback to strengthen our reporting. Tell us what\u2019s working and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":246729,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[138,140,139],"class_list":["post-246728","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-el-paso","tag-el-paso","tag-el-paso-headlines","tag-el-paso-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=246728"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/246728\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/246729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=246728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=246728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=246728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}