JUAN ESTEBAN ARISTIZABAL VASQUEZ

• TOP 1:    JUAN ESTEBAN ARISTIZABAL VASQUEZ

He was born August 9, 1972, better known as Juanes (for the contraction of his first and second name), is a Colombian musician who was a member of the heavy metal band Ekhymosis and is now a solo artist. In 2000, his solo debut album Fíjate Bien won three Latin Grammy Awards. According to his record label, Juanes has sold more than 15 million albums worldwide.

His follow-up album, Un Dia Normal, was released in 2002 and was later certified platinum in multiple countries throughout Latin America. Juanes' third album, Mi Sangre, which becomes an international bestseller, managing to position well in a number of countries around the world, achieved success due to the single "La Camisa Negra". He has since released La Vida... Es Un Ratico (2007) and P.A.R.C.E. (2010). On May 29, 2012 Juanes released the album Juanes MTV Unplugged

JAIME GARZON

• TOP 2:    JAIME GARZON

Jaime Garzón was born in Bogotá on October 24, 1960. He studied law and political science at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia, but his active involvement in politics and television did not allow him to finish.

He was a Colombian journalist, a comedian, lawyer, peace activist and political satirist. He was very popular on Colombian television during the 1990s, especially for his political satire. In addition to his work on television, he also had roles as a peace negotiator in the release of FARC guerrillas' hostages. He was murdered by suspected right-wing paramilitary forces in 1999, although the case remains opened and unsolved.

 

MANUEL ELKIN PATARROYO

• TOP 3:    MANUEL ELKIN PATARROYO

He was born March 11, 1946 is a Colombian pathologist who made the world's first attempt of synthetic vaccine for malaria, a disease transmitted by mosquitoes that affects millions of people in tropical and subtropical regions, including parts of the Americas, Asia, and Africa.

 The vaccine candidate, first developed in 1987, was evaluated in clinical trials carried out by the WHO in Gambia, Tanzania and Thailand, and had mixed results. In 2009, a comprehensive Cochrane review assessed the SPf66 as being not efficacious in Africa and Asia, and as having a low but statistically significant efficacy of 28% in South America. Today, after more than 33 years of research, the SPf66 malaria vaccine is not recommended for prophylaxis of malaria and is listed as "inactive" by the WHO.

MARTIN CHARLES SCORSESE

• TOP 4:    MARTIN CHARLES SCOTESESE

He was born November 17, 1942, is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest directors of all time. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation. He is a recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award for his contributions to the cinema, and has won an Academy Award, a Palme d'Or, Cannes Film Festival Best Director Award, Silver Lion, Grammy Award, Emmys, Golden Globes, BAFTAs, and DGA Awards.

Scorsese's body of work addresses such themes as Italian American identity, Roman Catholic concepts of guilt and redemption,[18] machismo, modern crime, and violence. Scorsese is hailed as one of the most significant and influential filmmakers of all time, directing landmark films such as Mean Streets (1973), Taxi Driver (1976), Raging Bull (1980), and Goodfellas (1990) – all of which he collaborated on with actor and close friend Robert De Niro. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for The Departed (2006), having been nominated previously 5 times; he has subsequently been nominated once more, bringing his total number of nominations for Best Director.

SUSAN SONTAG

• TOP 5:    SUSAN SONTAG

She was born 16 January, 1933 – December 28, 2004) was an American writer and filmmaker, professor, literary icon, and political activist. Beginning with the publication of her 1964 essay "Notes on Camp'", Sontag became an international cultural and intellectual celebrity. Her best known works include On Photography, Against Interpretation, The Way We Live Now, Iliness as Metaphor, Regarding the Pain of Others, The Volcano Lover and In America.

Sontag was active in writing and speaking about, or travelling to, areas of conflict, including during the Vietnam War and the Siege of Sarajevo. She wrote extensively about photography, culture and media, AIDS and illness, human rights, and communism and leftist ideology. Her often provocative essays and speeches sometimes drew criticism. The New York Review of Books called her "one of the most influential critics of her generation."

FERNANDO BOTERO

• TOP 6:    FERNANDO BOTERO 

He was born April 19, 1932, is a Colombian figurative artist. His works feature a figurative style, called by some "Boterismo", which gives them an unmistakable identity. Botero depicts women, men, daily life, historical events and characters, milestones of art, still-life, animals and the natural world in general, with exaggerated and disproportionate volumetry, accompanied by fine details of scathing criticism, irony, humor, and ingenuity.

Self-titled "the most Colombian of Colombian artists" early on, he came to national prominence when he won the first prize at the Salón de Artistas Colombianos in 1958. Working most of the year in Paris, in the last three decades he has achieved international recognition for his paintings, drawings and sculpture, with exhibitions across the world. His art is collected by major museums, corporations and private collectors. 

 

GONZALO ARANGO

• TOP 7:    GONZALO ARANGO

 

Gonzalo Arango Arias born in Andes, Antioquia 1931 - Tocancipá, Cundinamarca 1976, was a Colombian poet, journalist and philosopher. During a repressive phase of government in the 1940s he led a literary movement known as Nadaismo (Nothing-ism) Other young Colombian thinkers of his generation in the movement inspired by the Colombian philosopher Fernando González Ochoa.

Arango's life includes contrasts from an open atheism to an intense spirituality, and a strong criticism of the society of his time. Those contrasts can be read in the First Manifesto of Nadaísmo as "The artist is considered sometimes a symbol fluctuation between holiness and madness".

In 1947 he began to study Law in the University of Antioquia, but three years later he left the studies to devote himself to writing, starting with his first work " After the Man ".

Arango died in a tragic car accident in the city of Tocancipá in 1976 when he was planning to move to London so that "by losing me, Colombians win me".