Fernando Botero (Colombian b. 1932)

The kind of figurative work I do derives in a way from the experience of abstraction: it's not the same kind of figurative art as that practiced before abstraction. My compositions are based on the requirements of color and form, so I often have to turn a painting upside down in order to view it as an abstract work. Abstraction has taught us to arrange colors and forms in a self-sufficient manner, so I need complete freedom in matters of proportion and, up to a point, in color as well.

Fernando Botero