The Baroque World of
Fernando Botero

March 15, 2008 – June 8, 2008

Fernando Botero (b. 1932) is one of the most internationally popular artists working today. Using a broad range of media, the Colombian-born Botero has created a world of his own, one that is at once accessible and enigmatic.

Fernando Botero (b. 1932)
The First Lady, 1989
Oil on canvas, 80 x 65 inches
Private Collection

Botero is renowned for his extravagantly rounded figures combining the polish and excess of Spanish colonial baroque with the social realism of the Mexican muralists. Their humorous exaggeration belies the more serious content of Botero’s work—commentary on colonialism, political instability in Latin America, and the vernacular artistic traditions of the region, as well as European art history.



Fernando Botero (b. 1932) The Orchestra, 2001 Oil on canvas, 80 x 56 ¾ inches Private Collection	Fernando Botero (b. 1932) After Velasquez, 2005 Oil on canvas, 79 x 67 inches Private Collection	Fernando Botero (b. 1932) Dancer at the Barre, 2001 Oil on canvas, 64 ½ x 45 ½ inches Private Collection

The Baroque World of Fernando Botero is a major retrospective exhibition featuring 100 paintings, sculptures, and drawings. Drawn from Botero’s private collection and assembled over the past 50 years, this exhibition includes favorite works that the artist was unable to part with, as well as pieces reacquired years after they left his possession. Many have never before been exhibited in public.

This exhibition goes beyond the Delaware Art Museum’s galleries, as three of Botero’s sculptures are mounted in the Museum’s Copeland Sculpture Garden.

The Baroque World of Fernando Botero is organized and circulated by
Art Services International, Alexandria, Virginia.

Exhibition-Related Events

Fernando Botero: The Rebel

Film screening Sundays in the DuPont Auditorium
June 1 and June 8 | 2:00 p.m. | Free

This insightful and engaging film invites viewers into the world of Fernando Botero, Latin America’s most celebrated artist, including his childhood in Medellín, his first drawings, his journeys to Europe, his triumphs in New York, and his thoughts on life, art, and being Botero.

Big and Bold: The Art of Fernando Botero

Tuesdays, 13 and 20 | 10:00 a.m. – 11:00 a.m.
$24 Members/$30 Non-Members/Director’s Circle Members Free
Individual Lectures: $8 Members/$10 Non-Members

Join Monica Dominguez Torres, Ph.D., as she explores the fascinating world of Colombian artist Fernando Botero. Dr. Dominguez Torres is Assistant Professor and Associate Chair of Art History at the University of Delaware, specializing in Renaissance and Baroque art in the Hispanic world.

Click here to register or call 302-351-8551.

May 13
Botero’s Latin American Influences

May 20
Botero as Social Activist

Tours

Docents will lead tours of The Baroque World of Fernando Botero every Saturday at noon from March 15 through June 7. Spanish-language tours of the exhibition will be held at 1:00 p.m. on the following dates: March 15, March 16, April 6, May 4, and June 8.


Sponsors

This exhibition is presented in Delaware by

The Delaware Art Museum received a MetLife Foundation Museum and Community Connections grant to support exhibition-related programming. This exhibition is made possible, in part, by grants from the Delaware Division of the Arts, a state agency dedicated to nurturing and supporting the arts in Delaware, in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts. Technological support provided by Trellist^SM Marketing and Technology.