Edgar Yanez Zapata is a Venezuelan architect, artist and graphic designer. He graduated as an architect in 1986 from Central University (Universidad Central de Venezuela), in Caracas. There he was tought by architects such as Oscar Tenreiro and Alejandro Stein. Together with architect Antonio Ochoa Piccardo, Edgar worked at architecture studio and art gallery: Ochoarte. From 1986 trough 1992, he developed diverse interior design and restoration projects, while concurrently designing exhibition stands for local and international exhibitions for CORIMON, a holding company of 25 businesses. From 1987 through 1992, he taught Two Dimensional Design and Introduction to the Arts courses at Jose Maria Vargas University (Universidad Jose Maria Vargas) in Caracas, starting his teaching career in architecture, visual arts and graphic design.

His passion for music and foreign languages led him to study percussion and Brazilian lyrics, as well as Portuguese, at the Center for Brazilian Studies at the Embassy of Brazil (1992-1994), and English as a second language at the Venezuelan-American Center (CVA) in Caracas (1994-1996 y 2004).

Since 1992 he has devoted himself to the teaching of art and design while producing his own artwork. From 1992 through 1996, he worked as assistant professor and taught the courses: Graphic Expression I, II and III, intended for first year students at the School of Architecture of Simon Bolivar University (Universidad Simon Bolivar), under the supervision of architect and artist Walter Margulis, Head of the Department of Visual Composition.

At the end of 1996, he moved to Merida –a city located in the western Andean region of the country– where he continued working on art projects until 1998 when he was hired as a tenure track professor at the School of Art and Graphic Design of the Faculty of Art at Universidad de Los Andes, ULA (ranked number one among Venezuelan universities). At the ULA he has taught the following courses: Foundations of two dimensional design, Graphic techniques and Illustration. In 2001 he was appointed Head of the Department of Visual Arts and a year later Head of the Department of Graphic Design. Since 2000, Professor Yanez has been a member of the Center of Research on Aesthetics (CIE) of the Faculty of Humanities, as well as other research centers of the Universidad de Los Andes.

He has also published several articles and given multiple lectures at both the National Seminar of Aesthetics and the International Symposium of Aesthetics in Merida. His academic interests are in the areas of phenomenological and semiotic approaches to the understanding of the relationship between art and the urban space; he considers cities to be "laboratories for the arts". He is also interested in cultural issues involved in the developing of both expressive and communicating visual languages.

In 2003, Edgar Yanez was awarded a Fulbright Grant from the Department of State of the United States, to pursue the degree of Masters in Fine Arts, with a focus on Visual Communication. In 2006, he received his MFA degree from Northern Illinois University, where he worked intensively on visual research, as well as on several projects in indigenous pedagogical and cultural studies, the history of architecture and the semiotics of contemporary art. Back in Venezuela, and from March 2007 through July 2010, he worked as Director of School of Art and Graphic Design at the ULA, where he also coordinated admission processes, for both the Visual Arts and Graphic Design undergraduate programs. Currently, Edgar Yanez is enrolled in the last year of the PhD program in Hispanic studies, at the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures, from the University of Western Ontario in London, Canada. He's doing research on the impact of socio-political processes in the origin of aesthetics and spatial categories in the city. Concurrently to his research work, Edgar has been teaching Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese to undergrad students and to adults at the University of Western Ontario. 

His artwork has been shown in solo exhibitions in Venezuela and Canada, and in about fifty collective shows nationally and overseas. Of particular notice, he has participated in the Biennale Di Venezia together with Firminy studio from Universidad Central de Venezuela  (1985), National Biennial of Architecture at the Museo de Bellas Artes in Caracas with Julio González Araujo (1988), 55th Salon de Mai in Paris (2001), Salon Grandes et Jeunes D'aujourd'hui in Paris (2002) and Proximity, Northern Illinois University's annual MFA exhibition at ARC Gallery in Chicago (2007), Play me, I'm Yours in Toronto, Canada among others.

Edgar Yanez was born in San Fernando (Apure State), raised in Ciudad Bolivar (Bolivar State), Maturín (Monagas State) and Caracas (DC). Resided in Merida from November 1996 trough August 2010, and currently resides in London, Canada with his family. Since 1998 he has been married to Sonia Bravo, a film and TV producer from Caracas. Edgar and Sonia are the parents of two children: Maria Victoria and Daniel Alejandro.