Our previous Kick-About, on a theme of vanitas, got us contemplating the effects of time on our minds and bodies. Meanwhile, the portly subjects of Fernando Botero’s paintings are in rude health, inspiring this latest collection of ‘new works made in a short time’. For all previous editions of The Kick-About, visit here.
James Randall
“The voluminous works of Fernando Botero set a straight forward challenge as I found myself standing in front of a bowl of fruit – an obvious choice for subject! I drew up the shapes in illustrator then coloured it up in Photoshop. A few simple variations which weren’t as simple as they may look to create were then made.”
Jan Blake
“I’m not immediately attracted to Botero’s work, yet I was drawn to look further and began to realise some more understanding of the background to his work and appreciated his extraordinarily prolific output. In many ways it could not be more opposite to my own way of working. So thinking about how I could approach this, I looked at my love of making large works that transform a public space and how that related to Botero’s work for public spaces.
I have chosen the huge 4 metre leaves that hung in the Department of Farming and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) in London. They were made of silk organza stretched over a metal curved rod and hand-painted with dyes. They spun in a spiral slowly in this new space over 8 floors designated for discussions of world leaders re: Climate Change. Three leaves had a Trompe L’oeil dewdrop reflecting the building which was built in 1928. It just happened to be the same year that Escher engraved his leaf with a dewdrop and people were already talking about climate change. Ironically my leaves were taken down when the Conservative government took over…”
Charly Skilling
“Whilst Botero’s work is often driven by political satire, social commentary or simple humour, the images that captivated me are those depicting couples dancing. The men are portly, moustachio-ed, suited and booted, whilst the women are full-bodied, high-heeled, and crammed into skin-tight, blood red sheath dresses. But Botero still manages to evoke the lightness of foot, the sharp, staccato movement, and the passion of the dance.
For many years, through my twenties and thirties, I taught adult dance and exercise classes in small village halls and school gyms and many of the women who attended these classes carried rather more weight than they would like. Most had never danced before and few had any structured exercise regime. But the camaraderie, the good humour, and the mutual support these ladies brought to class made them a joy to teach. Botero’s ladies remind me of my 1980’s Keep Fit Ladies and I made these figures in honour of them. (Nylon tights, soft toy stuffing, and yarn.) I call them ‘The Three Graces’ – or ‘Wednesday Morning Yoga’. Enjoy.”
Kerfe Roig
“I like to draw sculpture, so I started with two of Botero’s paired dancers. Then I had the idea to try doing a colorful geometric collage, so I did that for two of his ballerinas that way.”
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Marion Raper
“Fernando Botero seems to have had a thing for making sculptures on the larger, voluminous size. I decided to try the opposite and using my lovely air-drying clay, I attempted making a slimline figure – plus, after watching the TV programme The Great Pottery Throw Down, I was inspired by their competition to make Flatback sculptures. These were once fashionable ornaments that originated in the Staffordshire Potteries and were much favoured by Victorians. They sat each end of the mantlepiece and thus had to have flat backs. My little figure however seems to have a flat chest and large feet to balance with!”
Graeme Daly
“I wanted to mimic the tongue and cheek nature of some of Botero’s work and there might be something postmodern in there with these images. I remember seeing something on Instagram of a father bringing his daughter to an exhibition showcasing Botero’s paintings and leaving extremely embarrassed as his daughter laughed for a good five minutes at one of Botero’s paintings depicting small facial features on a bloated face. I simply used an instagram filter that makes your facial features small and aimed the filter at my laptop of immortalised artists and their works. I was going to leave out the Dali and Warhol, but found it funny how the filter failed, especially when it couldn’t make sense of the ‘texture’ on Warhol’s face.”
@graemedalyart / vimeo.com/graemedaly / linkedin.com/in/graeme-daly / twitter.com/Graeme_Daly / gentlegiant.blog
Phil Gomm
“Perhaps like many of us now, I have a collection of odd things left over from previous Kick-Abouts; for example, a latex mask of a rather stern-looking older man, last seen in these Harry Clarke-inspired photographs produced for The Kick-About No.91. It occurred to me I could use the rubbery deformations of this mask as the subject for riffing on some of Botero’s ballooning of the human face.
These images began with the act of scanning the mask and then taking those scans into Premiere Pro (video editing software), where there’s one particular technique (intended for working in Virtual Reality), that enables you to play with a flat image plane as if it were in a three-dimensional space. The short version is I was able to further develop the in-scan distortions of this rubbery face. The resulting images are a long way from the whimsy of some of Botero’s portraits but find some association perhaps with the monstering of his Abu Ghraib paintings.”
And from Botero’s bodies to celestial bodies…
Red's Kingdom 
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