According to Botero, painting must be understood as an inner need, a need that leads to uninterrupted exploration towards the ideal framework. However, this need remains largely unfulfilled. The color remains soft, never exalted, never feverish, generally spread in flat and uniform fields, without contours. Note the total absence of the shadings in his paintings, because they, according to Botero "... would dirty the idea of the color I want to transmit".
Characteristic of his painting is the unusual expansion that his subjects undergo, that they acquire unusual forms, almost unreal. But it is a necessary passage to make understand the color necessity of his works. The artist reveals himself substantially distant from his subjects. And it is precisely this coldness that makes the moral and psychological dimension disappear from the characters. The eyes are always lost in the void, the eyes do not beat, it almost seems that they look without looking.
Also interesting is the representation of time, an element present in many works by Botero, in which the same subject can be depicted at different moments; in others time is symbolized by clocks.
Also important is the discussion of sacred themes, to which Botero dedicates many of his creations, permeating the entire production: from its urban landscapes emerge regularly large cathedrals, bell towers, domes; as often appears considered the subject of motherhood, in which sometimes the author identifies the Madonna with the Child. In a 2006 drawing, the artist takes up a scene already painted, but removes some modern details dear to him (the mother’s watch, the armchair) and representing the child with a wound on the side. I also attended the portraits of religious and clergymen.
