Early life Fernando Botero was born in
Medellín on 19 April 1932. His father, David Botero, a salesman who traveled by horseback, died when Fernando was four. An uncle took a major role in his life. Botero received his primary education at the Ateneo Antioqueño and, thanks to a scholarship, he continued his secondary education at the Jesuit School of Bolívar. In 1944, Botero's uncle sent him to a school for
matadors for two years. Some of his earlier drawings were inspired by the bullfight scene. He sold his first painting for two
pesos, thanks to a merchant who allowed him to display it in the window of his shop. His love of drawing nudes caused problems with his Roman Catholic education. He was expelled from school after defending Pablo Picasso's art in an essay.
Career Botero's work was first exhibited in 1948, in a group show along with other artists from the region. From 1949 to 1950, Botero worked as a set designer, before moving to
Bogotá in 1951. Young Botero also worked as a newspaper
illustrator to support his artistic interests and before attending San Fernando Academy. The
Pérez Art Museum Miami acquired a still life picture of Botero's early days of career depicting apples, an influence of European art historical movements and 20th-century painters. His first one-man show was held at the Galería Leo Matiz in Bogotá, a few months after his arrival. In 1952, using his gallery earnings, Botero sailed to Europe. He arrived in
Barcelona and then moved on to
Madrid. In Madrid, Botero studied at the
Academia de San Fernando and was a frequent visitor to the
Prado Museum, where he copied works by
Goya and
Velázquez. He sold his copies on the streets to make money. Around 1964, Botero made his first attempts to create sculptures. Due to financial constraints preventing him from working with bronze, he made his sculptures with acrylic resin and sawdust. A notable example during this time was
Small Head (Bishop) in 1964, a sculpture painted with great realism. The material was too porous, so he abandoned this method. He returned to sculpture "with enthusiasm" in Italy in the mid-1970s and exhibited his characteristic bronze sculptures for the first time at the
Grand Palais in Paris in 1977. A horrified Botero decided that the damaged sculpture should be left in place as a "monument to the country's imbecility and criminality" and donated an intact replica to stand alongside it. In 2004, Botero exhibited a series of 27 drawings and 23 paintings dealing with the violence in Colombia from 1999 through 2004. He donated the works to the
National Museum of Colombia, where they were first exhibited. between 2004 and 2005 as a permanent accusation. In 2005, Botero gained considerable attention for his
Abu Ghraib series, which was exhibited first in Europe. He based the works on
reports of United States forces' abuses of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison during the
Iraq War. Beginning with an idea he had had on a plane journey, Botero produced more than 85 paintings and 100 drawings in exploring this concept and "painting out the poison". In 2009, the
Berkeley Art Museum acquired (as a gift from the artist) 56 paintings and drawings from the
Abu Ghraib series, which can be seen online. Selections from the series have been regularly included in the museum's annual Art for Human Rights exhibitions. In 2006, after having focused exclusively on the
Abu Ghraib series for over 14 months, Botero returned to the themes of his early life such as the family and motherhood. In his
Une Famille Botero represented the Colombian family, a subject often painted in the 1970s and 1980s. In his
Maternity, Botero repeated a composition he had already painted in 2003. In 2008, he exhibited the works of his
The Circus collection, featuring 20 works in oil and watercolor. In a 2010 interview, Botero said that he was ready for other subjects: "After all this, I always return to the simplest things:
still lifes." ==Style==