For centuries before the 1900's, the mixed Spanish-indigenous ("mestizo") people of Mexico faced extreme hardships on behalf of both the abuse and neglect from colonist Spaniards. The heavy majority of the land rested in the hands of the few wealthy while the peasants (largely mestizo) had no control. Porfirio Diaz, President of Mexico from 1877-1880 and then again from 1884-1911 had made policies that kept the land out of the hands of the peasants. However, by 1910, the mestizo people had had enough and so began the Mexican Revolution from 1910-1920. By the end of the war, the country was recovering from troublesome times filled with injustice and many wanted to right the wrongs done to the mestizo people. For although progress was being made through the spread of ideals that favored the mestizo people, the country would benefit from a period of refinement.
Thus, in the early 1920's, the revolutionary Mexican government authorized a project known as "Mexican Muralism". Three men: Jose Clemente Orozco, David Alfaro Siquieros, and Diego Rivera began utilizing their skills in mural making to create politically packed paintings as a sign of a newly emerging government. Diego Rivera, son of an indigenous mother, identified with the struggles of the peasant class. The murals included in this exhibition are all located on the chapel walls of Chapingo Autonomous University in Mexico, the best known agricultural school in the country. They form a part of the larger "Tierra Fecundada" (Fertile Land) mural. While his murals serve as a sort of memorializing of the events of the Revolution, Rivera's prints (which were often taken from pieces of his murals) display the ideals of a newly refined government. As such, the prints held a sense of political significance as the election of Lazaro Cardenas approached in 1934. By cropping the images to fit a specific scene, Diego Rivera creates a sense of intimacy between the figures in the painting and the viewer. Through this sense of intimacy, Rivera uses his artwork (especially through his prints) as a political platform as he fused ideas of community, victory, rest, and abundance with the mestizo identity. Step into this revolutionary time and feel this connection as you compare a collection of Rivera's murals and prints side by side.
Artist: Diego Rivera
Date: 1926
Medium: Fresco
Dimensions: 354 x 357 cm
No Accession Number
Rivera often depicted particular details of the Mexican Revolution. While this mural does not display an actual historical event, gatherings such as these likely occurred frequently among the unsettled mestizo workers. The ideals of creating a democratic federal republic under President Benito Juarez (1861-1872) had been marred under the rule of Porfirio Diaz, who denied many rights to the mestizo people, especially in regard to land ownership. As leaders rose up in rebellion on behalf of the neglected peasant class, the workers gained more courage to gather and think of how to bring about a new era, one marked by proper distribution of the land. Here you see the mestizo workers (marked by their honest workman's attire), standing intent and ready to act as a new manner of life awaits them.
Title: Open Air School
Artist: Diego Rivera
Date: 1932
Medium: Lithograph
Dimensions: 31.8 x 41.6 cm
Art Institute Chicago
Reference Number: 1935.231
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Parallel to the mural above, a central speaker rests amidst a readily listening group of humble mestizo people. However, this time they are not all dressed in working attire, but rather the people sit more rounded and relaxed than hunched and ready for action. Rather than being prepared, they are being taught. This print, then, shows that though the hard days of labor and inequity were very real and very horrid, that a new order had come and those days were behind them. This new order is marked by a community and "oneness". Future President Lazaro Cardenas has aspirations of communal land ownership. As Rivera depicts this encircled group of people in the larger agricultural context, he feeds this idea of community into the identity of the mestizo people.
Title: The Exploiters
Artist: Diego Rivera
Date: 1926
Medium: Fresco
No Accession Number
Rivera not only wanted to create a sense of what was to come in a newly refined era, but also desired for the people to remember from where they had come. Liker the first mural, this image is not intended to depict an actual event, but rather to reveal the abuses which were laid upon the working mestizo people. It would be in recognition of the horrors that had passes that the people would feel a need for a better future. You can imagine a young agriculture student at Chapingo Autonomous University staring up at this picture and wishing to never again return to such as state as this where power and fear were wielded on behalf of the wealthy to dominate other human beings.
Title: Emiliano Zapata and His Horse
Artist: Diego Rivera
Date: 1932
Medium: Lithograph
Dimensions: 41.2 x 33.4 cm
The Met
Accession Number: 33.26.7
Through the leadership of men like Emiliano Zapata, the peasant class realized that they had an equal right to the land compared to the wealthy. By depicting such a scene, Rivera took time to remember the heroes of the Revolution as well as symbolize victory. The figures no longer bend in fear like in the mural above, but rather stand firm in dignity. Again, this image of victory is ingrained in the identity of the mestizo people. The people line up as in a parade to follow the leadership of the bold Emiliano while he holds his horse. In showing Zapata with his own horse, Rivera also gives a sense of dignity to the mestizo people for it would have been a rare sight to see a peasant with their very own horse. It was this sense of victory, dignity, and ownership that was intended to be experienced under the rule of Cardenas
Title: The Perpetual Renewal of the Revolutionary Struggle
Artist: Diego Rivera
Date: 1926-27
Medium: Fresco
Dimensions: 354 x 357 cm
No Accession Number
While small victories were being won behind the charge of men like Zapata and his followers, hardships remained. Diego Rivera does not want to forget that though victory was glorious, the road to get there was not always so. Instead of being adorned with farming tools and overalls, the men in this picture are adorned with rounds of bullets. The blood on the temple of the man on the right represents the hard fought fight while the figures kneeling over a dead body represent the tragic loss. Yet, amidst this tragedy, Rivera literally plants an idea of hope in the image of a blooming tree. He shows that out of the grounds of hardship and even death will bloom a new hope, a new agricultural life.
Title: Sleep
Artist: Diego Rivera
Date: 1932
Medium: Lithograph
Dimensions: 40.4 x 30.2 cm
Museum of Modern Art
Object Number: 635.1978
In relation to the mural above, Rivera goes from the tragic sleep of death while carrying the hope of new beginnings to the fulfilled sleep of rest. Again, notice how he ties in this ideal of rest into the mestizo identity by providing a blissful image of these sleeping figures. Though their heads are bowed, they do not mourn. You look up and notice their peaceful, rounded bodies as if you too have briefly awakened from your own resting place.
Title: Triumph of the Revolution 1926 Fresco
Artist: Diego Rivera
Date: 1926
Medium: Fresco
No Accession Number
At last! The struggles are ceasing, rest is coming, and abundance is near. The mestizo workers here are armed with neither farming tools nor weapons, but food. The hardship is coming to a close and the people are reaping the reward of their diligence. Again, we cannot view this with expectations that it is an historical event, but rather that this represents a scene of the joys and benefits from a long period of struggle.
Title: Fruits of Labor
Artist: Diego Rivera
Date: 1932
Medium: Lithograph
Dimensions: 41.9 x 30.2 cm
The Met
Accession Number: 33.26.8
In correlation with the mural above, Rivera uses this piece to usher up a new sense of abundance. Years of hard labor and neglect are finally paying off with the enjoyment of food. Yet, this print not only shows a parallel to the mural above, but also a culmination of all the other works before this. This group of mestizo people are once again being taught as in the first mural. Such echoes the ideals of education reform under Benito Juarez in the 19th century. They also sit encircled around one another, showing yet again the importance of the imagery of community and oneness. On behalf of the struggles and the victory, the people now restfully enjoy the fruit of their own hands. Rivera ties in all these ideals right here, in the intimate image of a dignified group of mestizo people.
Super good job man. I like how you were able to find all of the pieces of artwork that show community/highlight being proud of where they came from. Your information about each piece is very helpful and everything seems to flow nicely.
ReplyDeleteI love how you take us through the history of the Mexican Revolution. It is interesting to see that a lot of the struggle is depicted by a pareyful or restful sitting and waiting. Honor is preserved as well and there is not a lot of gore in these depictions which is refreshing. But the story of tragedy is is till portrayed by faces and body language.
ReplyDeleteGood job Josh! I thought the ordering of the artworks was great and I though the show was such a great peek into a part of history that I didn't know as much about.
ReplyDelete