Throughout her career, Arango used her artwork to explore many politically charged and controversial issues, her subjects ranging from nude women to the role of the Roman Catholic Church to dictatorships.

In the library of her aunt, she discovered philosophers and writers of all tendencies and through her brothers, medical students, she accessed anatomy books that allowed the study of the human body.

In this institution she was a student of the Italian sister Maria Rabaccia, who learned about the artistic abilities of the young Débora and encouraged her to move forward in the world of painting.

[2] In those years of the second decade of the twentieth century, women were not granted the same bachelor's degree that men received, but a certificate of studies.

In the female curriculum emphasis was placed on the teaching of tasks that qualified them for a future domestic performance, such as dressmaking and culinary, and others that were believed to contribute to the cultivation of their personality, such as crafts, music and sometimes painting.

[1] In 1931 the painter Eladio Vélez returned to Medellín, began to give private classes in his house; to which Débora came to study painting.

Maestro Pedro Nel Gómez returned to Medellín after studying in Italy, and by 1935 he started the frescoes of the Municipal Palace.

Débora communicated with him to admit her as a disciple in his workshop; there she felt more at ease and identified with his concepts and his more expressive technique; from him she learned the dynamics of form, the vitality of movement and coloring.

In November 1939 she was invited by the Society of Friends of Art to participate in the "Salon of Professional Artists" in Club Unión, the most prestigious social center in Medellin.

On the other hand, the nudes were judged as scandalous by social sectors whose voices were taken by the local conservative press, as is the case of the newspaper La Defensa, which commented: "... an impudent work that not even a man should exhibit ...".

In the midst of the scandal, Débora Arango expressed a concept without antecedents in the national artistic milieu, today much cited about her painting: "art, as a manifestation of culture, has nothing to do with moral codes.

Along with the picture Annunciation of Carlos Correa, in the history of Colombian art there are no other works that have caused a controversy similar to that aroused by the nudes of Débora Arango, who at that time was 32 years old.

Both eagerness in defense of morality on the part of conservative journalists and even Eladio Vélez himself, contrasts with the harsh reality that was lived in Medellin.

On the occasion of the scandal, Débora was called by Father Miguel Giraldo, parish priest of the Church of San José, who advised her to remove the nudes and not continue painting them.

The anonymous columnist considered as of "extreme gravity" that the Ministry of Education sponsored the exhibition of the "artistic esperpentos", which he rejected as an indication of "laziness and inability".

This same idea was the argument with which Laureano Gómez, in an aggressive press article, had disqualified three years earlier what was understood as expressionism.

The commotion for the work of Débora Arango was renewed in 1942, when the Municipal Magazine of Medellín published an eulogistic article about the painter with several illustrations, half of which were nudes.

Outraged by the neighborhood with the painter and the nudes, the prelate asked to pick up the edition and a strong debate took place in the City Council.

She begins to dabble in a new facet, characterized by political satire, in which she interpreted different events and the climate of anxiety, violence and mortality of the moment.

While accompanying and she takes care of her father, she produces numerous ceramic pieces and painted tiles to decorate the baseboards and walls of her residence.

In February 1955 she opened an exhibition with thirty works at the Institute of Hispanic Culture, which was closed the next day by order of the Spanish Francoist government, which produced one of the greatest frustrations of her life.

Two years later she exhibited 37 paintings in the Marian Congregation, which she had to hastily pick up, since the popular demonstrations for the fall of General Rojas Pinilla made her fear for the fate of her work.

Excited by the exhibition, she returned to paint for about two years, producing some satirical oils and numerous watercolors of bathers, couples, women in different situations, walkers, clowns, and in general, human types of the most varied condition.

[1] Jose Orozco's works, which Arango studied at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes, also significantly affected her, influencing her future techniques and style.

It was her paintings of female nudes that first instigated debate; labeled obscene by the Catholic Church, they were also rejected by the public and other artists.

In 1944, Arango joined a group of artists who, similar to the Mexican muralists of the time, were emphasizing the importance of public art, murals that were accessible to all.

This group wrote a manifesto of their ideas which they presented as "Manifiesto de los Independientes", emphasizing their desire to use art to enlighten the public.

This is Arango referencing the corruption in the government that was behind all this violence in Colombia, because these "chulos" were greatly feared by the people and were responsible for countless deaths.