Botero: Abu Ghraib

The world was shocked in 2003 by the revelation that U.S. guards had mistreated and tortured Iraqi prisoners at the notorious Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad. In response, the renowned Colombian artist Fernando Botero created a series of riveting paintings and drawings that constitute an acerbic and poignant statement against violence and man's inhumanity to man. The 73-year-old artist, drawing on his knowledge of Renaissance art, has produced a body of works that are timely yet timeless, a vision of hell on earth belonging to a long, noble tradition of artistic statements against war and violence that includes Goya's "Caprichos" and Picasso's "Guernica", the works of the Mexican muralists, more recent politically charged works by Philip Guston and Leon Golub, and Botero's own 1980s paintings of the effects of drug violence in Colombia. Born in Medellin, Colombia, in 1932, Fernando Botero studied in Madrid and in Florence, learning the fresco techniques of the Italian masters, and in Mexico City where he encountered the work of the muralists Rivera, Orozco, and Siqueiros. His paintings are in the permanent collections of major museums; his public monuments in bronze include Broadgate Venus, erected in Exchange Square in London.