José Ruiz
MacKaben was born in Lansing, Michigan, in 1920. A World War II veteran from Chicago, he received a diploma in drawing from the School of Art Institute of Chicago in 1948. Soon afterwards, he went to Mexico where he studied at the Insituto Allende in San Miguel de Allende 1948-49 and, from 1949–1950, at the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes, Mexico City, where he studied under David Alfaro Siqueiros and José Ruiz. In 1953, he graduated from the Art Institute of Chicago with a B.A. in education.