Tablao Flamenco, Fernando Botero (1984)
pleasure comes from the sensuality of life
Few artists paint with an exuberance for life in all its manifestations like Fernando Botero. Botero himself stated that he painted to “glorify the sensuality of life”. More than that, his use of colour and form capture the abundance of life, a richness that only comes from the humble appreciation for life’s simplicity.
Born in 1932 in Medellin, Colombia, he was raised by a single mother after the death of his father when Botero was just 4 years of age. He started painting watercolours as a young boy in exchange for tickets to bull fights. His early images captured the boldness of movement and colour displayed by the matadors and bulls, and quickly gained him notoriety.
A Botero painting always feels alive. Botero’s choice to paint with voluminous proportion and bold colour amplify the vitality of his subjects. They emit an energy that is somehow both rapturous and humble. In Tablao Flamenco, the subjects are painted with such magnitude of individual form and, within their composition, they feel close to bursting both from their clothing and from the edges of the canvas. The composition is so crowded that the central flamenco dancer appears to be kicking and stepping on the other women in the scene. Further, their round faces reflect a purity of spirt like the innocent pink face of a child. This conveys a sense of liberation, invoking a feeling of prosperity and joy in the moment. The saturated colours jump off the canvas and excite a viewer’s eyes. The subjects are captured in ecstatic motion and you are moved to join in.
It is therefore, difficult to observe a Botero in stillness. The paintings, and even his sculptures, radiate and pulsate with the life force of Fernando himself. They speak to us in whistles and hums, in laughter and song, and create a symphony of collective merriment that shifts the viewer’s own energy. They demand that we appreciate the abundance of life that surrounds us. One feels called to move with them, to inhabit the joy and struggles of his subjects, even if just for a moment. To stand in witness of a Botero is to take in the richness that life offers each one of us.
Botero was a maestro of Hum.