[1] Completely self-taught, he painted using crude mixtures of colors that he made using materials from the earth, excelling as a painter of portraits "that he drew without the need to have the person in view at the time of portraying them.
"[3] This is from his biographer, José María Morillas who recounts that in order to make a portrait of Archbishop Valera (1814–1833), who refused to be painted, his relatives gave the artist the opportunity to see him while he prayed.
[4] Velásquez also decorated the palatial spaces of Sans-Souci Palace with the theme of mythological gods, reinterpreted "with Ethiopian color and features.
"[4] Taking into account that Velásquez developed in the last decades of the changing colonial regime of Santo Domingo (1795–1821), it is most likely that many of his portraits from this period are preserved as anonymous paintings, considering he did not sign his works.
It was during this time that he gathered materials regarding the eastern side of the island, the once-Spanish colony, for his essay in which he states the painter Velásquez as the creator of the paintings of the twelve apostles located in one of the chapels of the cathedral.