Fernando Botero

“I follow politics very closely. I read several newspapers every day.”

“Bullfights have so much color. Not just the matador but also the bull, the arena, and the public. It's all very festive.”

“The circus leaves a sweet memory.”

“Art is always an exaggeration in some sense; in color, in form, even in theme, etc... but it has always been this way. It is the same with the nature of some works by Giotto or Massacio, or the color of life as expressed by Van Gogh.”

“Nobody ever told me, 'Art is this.' This was good luck in a way because I would have had to spend half of my life forgetting everything that I had been told, which is what happens with most students in schools of fine arts.”

“The circus allows one to be logical and unreal at the same time. In the circus, all is possible: there can be a man with two heads or a character with a green face.”

“Before anything else, I started painting bulls and matadors. That was my initiation to paint.”

“I love art so much because of curiosity. At the start of a painting, I know 10 percent of what the painting will be, and then I have to improvise the whole thing.”

“The circus is a global theme. It exists in all parts of the world - maybe not in Africa, but it exists in Asia in all parts. In Latin America, it's difficult to find a person who hasn't gone to the circus.”

“All the animals I've painted always have a relationship with man. I have been told that part of the knowledge of the human anatomy comes from animals.”

“There's nothing more superficial to do than to paint a beautiful woman. The most beautiful portraits in art were of ugly women. If you paint Brigitte Bardot, it's a disaster. Sunsets, you have to stay away from sunsets. You paint a sunset, you are in great danger.”

“I have the sensation of doing something good for people, more than being a trendy artist or a successful artist.”

“I'm the most Colombian of the Colombians, even though I've lived 47 years outside of Colombia. I've lived 13 years in New York, and I never did a painting about New York. I've lived in France more than 30 years, and I've never painted Paris.”

“I had wanted to be a sculptor throughout life, but to do so, I had to stop painting.”

“I often think about death, and it saddens me to leave this world and not be able to paint more. I love it so much.”

“I have seen Colonial churches since I was very small, Colonial painting and polychrome sculpture. And that was all I saw. There was not a single modern painting in any museum, not a Picasso, not a Braque, not a Chagall. The museums had Colombian painters from the eighteenth century and, of course, I saw Pre-Columbian art. That was my exposure.”

“My popularity has to do with the divorce between modern art, where everything is obscure, and the viewer who often feels he needs a professor to tell them whether it's good or not. I believe a painting has to talk directly to the viewer, with composition, color and design, without a professor to explain it.”

“An artist is born like a priest is born. If they are born an artist, I would tell them art is not a game: it is something very serious which completely requires everything you have to give.”

“I love my country, and it hurts not to be able to see my country, as I did for so many years. I hope that I will one day be able to live in a peaceful Colombia.”

“Bullfights are a very cultural thing. I know many people think it's cruel, but so many things are cruel. Hunting, the electric chair, wars. These are all cruel things as well.”