This biographical documentary by Don Millar presents a rich portrait of the life and art of Columbian artist and sculptor Fernando Botero. Fernando Botero’s figurative art is well known for its “monumentality”—whereby objects and people are generous in size—sometimes to comic proportions. The film makes several claims that Botero is the most well-known living artist today. He has highly successful exhibitions in major cities around the globe with record attendance and several books have been published about his life and art.
Now in his eighties, Botero fondly and sometimes humorously recalls his early years of struggling to become a successful artist. His sons Fernando and Juan Carlos and his daughter Lina listen to their Dad’s stories with plenty of smiles. The editing is excellent, giving viewers a glimpse of Botero's famous paintings and sculptures as well as historical photos of the artist throughout his long career. Narrators include curators, gallery directors, authors, art faculty, family, and more. Only one professor criticizes Botero; largely, this film is a celebration of Botero’s work.
Fernando Botero was born in Medellin, Columbia in 1932. His first watercolor paintings dealt with bullfighting. The unjust violence of the Chulavitas inspired him to paint “Frente al Mar” which gives him enough money to travel to Spain. There, he studies the masterpieces of Velasquez and Goya and the masters of the Renaissance in Florence. Impressed with 14 century Renaissance painting, Botero becomes captivated with the painting's sense of mass, proportions, and volume.
When he runs out of money, he travels to Mexico where the vivid colors inspire his next paintings; one author comments that Botero is an amazing colorist. Botero realizes “for art to be universal, it has to be local." He paints a mandolin with large proportions but with a small hole in the center; to Botero, the mandolin seems to explode and grow in monumentality. This discovery reinforces Botero’s choice to paint objects and people with generous proportions, which he continues throughout his career in painting and sculpture.
Some of the eminent works that bolster Botero’s career include his reimagining of the Mona Lisa with humor, fullness, and color, later purchased by The Museum of Modern Art. Botero’s series of impactful paintings on the abuses of prisoners at Abu Ghraib was donated to Berkeley. In his later years, Botero created two museums in Columbia. Botero donated all of his art. In the Bogota museum, he donated all of his art as well as the masterpieces he acquired. Bronze sculptures adorned a plaza named for him in his hometown of Medellin.
With such a large variety of paintings and sculptures, personal interviews with Botero and his adult children, and comments from art experts, the viewer gains a wonderful look at this artist's life work. Highly recommended. Aud: J, H, C, P.