Originally a member of a group that called themselves Los Once (The Eleven), Martínez found success in all of his artistic endeavors until the end of his life in 1995.

Martínez was born Publio Amable Raúl Martinez González in Ciego de Ávila, Cuba, on 1 November 1927, as the son of a sugar-mill worker and a teacher.

His work has participated in collective and personal expositions and the biennials of Mexico; São Paulo, Brazil; Venice, Italy and in the Salon de Mai, Paris, France.

The Council of State of the Republic of Cuba offered him the Distinction of National Culture, 1981; the Medal Alejo Carpentier, 1983 and the Order Félix Varela, 1988.

His earlier works were a typification of Cuban art of the time: the outcome of a play with expressionist and post-cubist devices, and has been described as "competent, stereotypical, and forgettable".

[2] Substantial to the progression of Martínez's work was the importance of his life-partner, Abelardo Estorino, a prominent playwright and poet in Cuba at the time.

(The literacy rate of the average adult went from 20%, to over an astounding 75% over the course of 12 years)[5] When later asked why at the time he did not go with socialist realism, Martínez answered that "Cuban artists were building upon something that had not been built up yet; they could experiment, but they could not take anything for granted.

During his time studying at the Institute of Design in Chicago, Illinois, pop art was just beginning to emerge in the United States.

Later in his career, after being fired from the school of architecture in Havana, Raúl Martínez soon began his work as a freelance designer and made countless contributions to the Cuban Film Institute, and other centralized government organizations (before the decentralization of powers on Cuba under Fidel's reign).

Otherwise known as the ICAIC (the acronym before translation), the organization played a major role in both the importance of the revolution to the history and development of Cuba, as well as perpetuating the inclusion of popular art within the culture.

Examining his work throughout his lifetime, one can trace the artistic progression of Cuban art from Abstract Expressionism, to the later collages of militaristic figures.

Cuba's National Museum of Fine Arts dedicates a large space in the permanent collections halls to Raúl Martínez.