Colombian teacher Fernando Botero, who died in Monaco at the age of 91, will be laid to rest for three days starting next Friday at the National Capitol in Bogota, as part of the tributes that will be paid to him in the country, it was reported this Monday, the President Congress, Senator Iván Name.
The children of painters and sculptors announced that the master’s body would be transferred to Bogotá next Thursday for the tributes, which will continue in Medellín, his hometown, before his burial in Pietrasanta (Italy), the city where he lived for the last decades.
“We invite Colombia, to Bogota, so that those who want to come to say goodbye to him, do so peacefully and freely,” said Senator Name, who added that Boter’s body “will be in the cremation chamber from Friday at eleven in the morning until Monday”.
After this popular honor in Kaptol, mass will be celebrated in The Primate’s Cathedral in Bogotáwhere we will say goodbye to the greatest artist of our country for the last time, added the President of the Senate.
Fernando, Lina and Juan Carlos Botero Zea, children of the teacher, said today in a statement that “given the touching reaction of the Colombian people and the generous invitation of the national, departmental and municipal authorities, as well as the National Congress of Colombia, (…) the body of our father we will take him to his beloved homeland for a final farewell.”
Fernando Botero Angulo was born in Medellín on April 19, 1932 and is recognized as the most universal Colombian artist for his figurative style, developed through the soft forms of his voluminous figures that he never liked to be called “fat”.
Caravan and Eucharist in Medellín
After paying tribute in Bogotá, the artist’s body will be transferred on Monday afternoon, the 25th, to the department of Antioquia, whose capital is Medellín, where it will be received at one of the city’s two airports to begin a caravan to the Museum of Antioquia, where it is the largest Botero collection in the world.
“Immediately (the coffin) will arrive, we will transport it in a caravan so that many people during the journey can say goodbye to it and pay their respects,” Antioquia Governor Aníbal Gaviria revealed at a press conference.
Gaviria added that the remains of the painter and sculptor will remain from Monday afternoon until Thursday, September 28, in a crematorium at the museum, located next to the emblematic Plaza Botero square, so that it can be “visited and forgiven by the people of Antioquia.”
“We will have the incineration chamber open from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. continuously in the museum; we are making available all the rooms and the entire building to do this,” said the director of the museum, María del Rosario. Escobar.
On Thursday the 28th, around three o’clock in the afternoon, according to Gaviria, a mass will be held in the Metropolitan Cathedral of Medellín as “the last act of farewell for Maestro Fernando Botero” in his homeland.
The artist’s children pointed out that after the tributes in Bogotá and Medellín, the coffin will be transferred to Italy “so that he can finally rest with his beloved wife Sophia Vara, in the Pietrasanta cemetery”.
The wish expressed by the teacher to be buried in Pietrasanta “is not so much for the fact that he is in one country or another, but to be next to the love of his life,” said the artist’s eldest son, Fernando Botero Zea. EFE. , in relation to Sophia Vari, who died last May.
Source: Panama America
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