Fernando Botero

THE OUTSTANDING Colombian artist of the twentieth century is Fernando Botero, who has attained a universal reputation in recent years. He studied the Great Masters of European art and the influence of such disparate artists as Uccello, Piero della Francesca, Mantegna, Velazquez and Rubens is discernible in his work, which exalts form while exploring new realities. His work is by no means rigidly classicist, but he has combined his studies of the Old Masters with a detailed examination of the popular indigenous art of Colombia. The extraordinary range of his work, encompassing figures, portraits, landscapes and genre subjects, is characterized by ironic humour and warm humanity, coupled with wry, shrewd observation of the scenes and people around him. Figures are often depicted in a curious pneumatic fashion with fixed expressions on their grossly inflated faces, deliberately producing a naive style. Botero has also produced a number of monumental sculptures, chiefly of female nudes.

Excerpt from Art. The World of Art, from Aboriginal to American Pop, Renaissance Masters to Postmodernism.