Alejandro Jesús Obregón Rosės (4 June 1920 – 11 April 1992) was a Colombian painter, muralist, sculptor and engraver.

[1] In 1948, he became Director of the School of Fine Arts in Santafé de Bogotá, where he was influenced by the fresco style of artists Pedro Nel Gómez and Santiago Martinez Delgado.

[6][2] Critic Marta Traba identified a series of characteristic elements in Obregon's work: personal poetic values; self-sufficiency in regard to freedom of form; search for identity based on the landscape, zoology, and flora; elliptic space people by magic elements; and contempt for urban culture.

He was witness to the popular revolt of April 9, 1948, and became especially interested in interpreting that event, which would reach its maximum expression in his oil Violencia.

This system was recognized at the Ninth São Paulo Biennial, where he represented Colombia in his own pavilion and was awarded the Francisco Matarazzo Sobrinho Grand Prize for Latin America.

Estudiante Muerto, awarded the national prize for Colombia at the 1956 Guggenheim International Exhibition,[citation needed] belonged to a group of paintings commemorating students and popular leaders who lost their lives during this period of social unrest.

Velorio (Wake), also known as Estudiante fusilado (Executed Student) and other similar names, was one of Obregón's most prominent commentaries on La Violencia.

In this piece, Obregón displays his early cubist influence, evident in the reduction of details and objects into elemental shapes.

[10] In Violencia (1962), Obregón conveyed the ominous atmosphere and perversion evident in the violence that occurred in rural areas.

While the presentation date of Violencia cannot tie the painting to any specific instance, it can be inferred that he was aware of the atrocities of the time.

[10] Tierra, mar y aire (Earth, Sea, and Wind) is a mural currently on the façade of the Mezrahi building, located at 53 Carrera and 76th Street in Barranquilla, Colombia.

[11] It took Obregón around a year to finish the mural, as he chose an extremely delicate and time-consuming approach, requiring a complex process called mosaic.

It is an acrylic mural on mortar cement, measuring 16.5x9 meters, featuring bright and sweeping geometric patterns devoid of the brushstrokes that are typical of his work.