Hispanic Icon Series 3

Fernando Botero
Fernando Botero is one of the most influential contemporary artists in the world. Botero comes from a humble background in Medellín, Columbia. He has received numerous awards and his works have been exhibited in many of the major galleries and museums around the world. Botero is famous for his characteristic rotund figures. His manner is satirical, reflecting social commentary with a political overtone. In 1956, he taught at the School of Fine Arts of the University of Bogotá and traveled to Mexico to study the work of Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco. In 1969, the Inflated Images exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York established him as one of the Masters of the Twentieth Century. Although at first impression his signature style seems purely esthetic, a deeper interpretation of his work suggests a mockery of the excesses of militarists, people of power and the morals and manners of the bourgeoisie.




Pedro Almodóvar
In 1988, Pedro Almodóvar received an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Film for his film Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown. In 1999, Almodóvar took the film world by storm with his critical smash, All About My Mother. That year, he was awarded with a coveted Oscar and with the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival. Almodóvar’s outrageous films have no problems breaking taboos. A provocative director known for his compassionate portrayal of women and outcasts, he started his career as an amateur director while working at the Spanish telephone company in Madrid.