This beautiful painting from 1979 titled 'The Musicians' was sold for a whooping 5,132,000 USD at Christie's 20th Century evening sale on November 9th, breaking Fernando Botero's previous auction record of 4,320,000 USD for a bronze sculpture titled 'Man on a Horse', sold at Christie's New York in 2022.
The painting, with its grand scale and complex composition, can easily be considered one of the artist’s greatest achievements in oil, alongside such masterpieces as Dancing in Colombia from 1980 (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York) and Tablao flamenco from 1984. What makes this handful of works truly exceptional is their ability to both parody and honor everyday life in Colombia, elevating the subject to the monumental dimensions of history painting.
"I started to paint these volumetric figures when I was 17. I did it by intuition… because it said something to me. Then, of course, when I was in Europe, especially in Italy, I rationalized the importance of volume because I saw that all Italian painters like Michelangelo, Raphael, Giotto, Masaccio, Piero della Francesca made a celebration of volume” - Fernando Botero