Julio Aparicio Díaz

Early life

Aparicio was born on January 4, 1969 in Seville, Spain, and is the son of Julio Aparicio Martínez, who was a famous torero in the 1950s and 1960s and the grandson of Julio Aparicio Nieto, who was also involved in bullfighting. Aparicio's mother is Malena Loreto, a famous flamenco dancer and his sister Kika Aparicio is an actress. Aparicio made his first public appearance in relation to bullfighting on September 2, 1984 at the Arenas de San Pedro. In 1986, Aparicio, while thinking about studying law, decided to leave everything for a career in bullfighting at the age of sixteen.

Career

Aparicio débuted as a novillero, a fighter of young bulls, on February 8, 1987 in Gandia, Spain alongside Fernando Lozano and Gregorio de Jesús as a picador. Later that year, he went to the European Parliament in Strasbourg to defend the Spanish tradition of bullfighting. Aparicio received his alternativa (alternative), a ceremony which a novillero starts fighting mature bulls for the first time as a torero, on April 15, 1990 at the Royal Cavalry of Seville. After that, he made his French début in Nîmes on May 16, 1991 at the Arena of Nîmes.

Aparicio had his confirmación, a confirmation of his status as a torero, four years later on May 18, 1994 at Las Ventas in Madrid. He also received a confirmación in Mexico on November 13, 1994. Aparicio was greatly praised from fans for his performance at his confirmación in May. On the fifth bull of the afternoon, Aparicio fought a bull of the Alcurrucén breed named Cañego. This performance is regarded as his best, and the one that established him as a top bullfighter.

From 1994 to 1998 he was advertised to participate in a majority of the bullfighting festivals held in Spain and France. At the 1998 San Isidro Festival, he served as the Godfather to Morante de la Puebla for Puebla's confirmación ceremony. On June 4, 1998, he announced his withdraw from events, and was inactive until 2000. He had his reaparición, or comeback, on March 15, 2000 in an event with José María Manzanares and Juan Bautista in Fitero.

In the following years since his return to the major fairs where he gained his notability, he has had several mishaps which has resulted in not being reviewed as favorable compared to years past. On March 23, 2008, at Las Ventas, he was gored by a bull which caused a severe laceration in his left thigh. Also, prior to his accident on May 21, he only had four performances for the 2010 season. He was considered favorable for two of the eight bulls he fought, and he was booed in his last performance at Nîmes, France before the accident. He has drawn criticism of not being "glamorous", not being close enough to the bulls to be considered dangerous, and not making the bull "dance" in his later years.

On May 21, 2010, Aparicio was severely injured during a performance when a bull gored him. Aparicio was participating in the San Isidro Festival in Las Ventas, performing with a 530 kg (1,168 lb) bull named Opiparo when he lost his footing and was gored through the neck and out of his mouth by the bull's right horn. The incident happened as Aparicio was attempting the faena, a series of passes in which a torero uses their cape and sword before delivering the estocada, or death blow. The bull immediately withdrew its horn from Aparicio's neck and he attempted to leave the bullring, but lost consciousness and had to be carried out. Two other matadors stepped in and slew Opiparo. The result of the injury was a punctured tongue, a fractured hard palate, a fractured upper maxilla and several broken teeth. Doctors at Las Ventas operated on Aparicio for an hour and performed an emergency tracheotomy to stabilize him. He was transferred to the October 12 Hospital in Madrid where he underwent six hours of surgery to repair his fractured jaw. He left the intensive care unit on May 24 after recovering from surgery. He went back to the hospital in critical condition on May 28 due to acute respiratory failure that required ventilation through a breathing tube due to swelling from an infection. He left the hospital on June 6 after recovering once again.

After the accident, Aparicio fired his manager Simon Casas who had said in an interview that Aparicio would not be able to psychologically recover so quickly. Aparicio made a return to bullfighting in Pontevedra on August 1, ten weeks after the accident. He later revealed that on the day of the accident, he had competed with a broken middle finger on his left hand.