On Wednesday, 26 November, at 12 noon, the exhibition RECUERDOS Y ESPERANZAS (MEMORIES AND HOPES), by renowned Arequipa watercolourist Evaristo Callo, was open to the public at the Inca Garcilaso Cultural Centre of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Evaristo Callo (Arequipa, 1960) studied at the Escuela Regional de Bellas Artes Carlos Baca Flor (Carlos Baca Flor Regional School of Fine Arts) in his hometown and obtained an artist residency at the Edinburgh College of Art, Scotland (2005). He has held solo and group exhibitions in Peru, Germany, Argentina, Azerbaijan, Bolivia, Korea, Costa Rica, Canada, China, Chile, Colombia, Scotland, Ecuador, Spain, the United States, Hungary, the Canary Islands, Italy, Morocco, Mexico, Panama, Portugal, the United Kingdom, the Dominican Republic, Switzerland, Thailand and Turkey.

In 2024, at the OAS headquarters in the US capital, he unveiled an important diptych, specially commissioned, together with the Secretary-General of the aforementioned organisation.

The poet Alonso Ruiz-Rosas, in his profile of the artist, notes that “…he learned to read and write in a state school that operated in a dilapidated urban tram carriage that had been taken out of service in those years. The place could not have been more inspiring, despite its precariousness, and perhaps it instilled in him the wanderlust that would later characterise him, with that constant need to venture out to new horizons and then return to his original neighbourhood where, incidentally, he continues to live.” (…) “Perhaps one of his greatest attributes is his ability to combine, through his skills in drawing and the chromatic harmony of his broad palette, misty touches, subtle unexpected strokes, foreshortening, and abstract silhouettes, which, as added elements arranged appropriately, enhance his accurate images. The nostalgic, emotional charge that he achieves is moving and touching, but not cloying. The long-awaited goal of moving from appearances to essences finds a successful accomplisher in Evaristo Callo.”

Callo has received numerous international awards and his work is part of the Alfredo Guati Rojo National Watercolour Museum Collection in Mexico City; the Watercolour Museum in Toluca, Mexico; the Essex Collection of Art from Latin America, University of Essex, United Kingdom; the Museum of Contemporary Art in Arequipa; the OAS Art Collection, United States; and numerous private collections.

The exhibition, comprising 22 works in various formats, will be open to the public at Jirón Ucayali 391, Historic Centre of Lima, until 22 March 2026, Tuesday to Friday, from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.