Tag Archives: political art

Mexican Muralists Envision New Nation Post-Revolution

Art history is a fascinating way to learn more about Mexico and the figures who shaped the nation — political, social, cultural. Through their interpretation of characters and events, the famed muralists — Diego Rivera, David Alfara Siqueiros, and Jose Clemente Orozco — gave definition to a new nation seeking to redefine itself post-1920 Revolution. We call this Mexican Muralism.

Mexico City skyline with active volcano Popocatepetl in distance
Marion Greenwood mural, circa 1934, Abelardo Rodriguez Market

While I’m now in Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca, I’m reflecting back to last weekend in Mexico City, where, in collaboration with my art historian friend Valeria, we led a group of nine participants from the USA through the historic center. Here is where a turbulent history is interpreted through art. We started on Thursday evening and ended on Sunday afternoon, packing it in, walking miles each day, absorbing a fascinating evolution.

Rivera mural at SEP, circa 1923-1928
Orozco’s bleak worldview, Colegio San Ildefonso

Mexico is defined by many internal and external forces, mostly her on-going desire to reconcile the Spanish conquest with her indigenous origins. Embracing Mestizaje — blending indigenous roots with conquerors, occupiers and immigrants, is what makes Mexico unique among nations, and very different from her northern neighbors.

At Colegio San Ildefonso, Orozco mural Cortes and La Malinche
Rivera’s idyllic Aztec landscape, another worldview

Rivera, who sat out the 1910-1920 Revolution, painting and making a name for himself in Europe, returned to Mexico City in 1921. Jose Vasconcelos, the first minister of education, recruited Rivera to paint the murals at the Secretariat de Educacion Publica (SEP), his first commission.

Unfinished Siquieros mural, SEP — newest building near Plaza Santa Domingo

The murals of Rivera, Orozco and Siquieros are commentaries on national identity, statehood, oppression and power. The Rivera murals at SEP in particular were part of a national communication plan (aka propaganda) to embrace native culture and arts. Critics say Rivera’s murals are romantic and idealistic. His contemporaries, survivors of the Revolution, painted a more hopeless, violent vision, expressing their belief that the past must be destroyed in order to create a new order.

Mazahua vendor at Casa Azul
Orozco’s interpretation of death of the old order

By Sunday, we move more deeply into the life and times of Frida Kahlo with a visit to Casa Azul, a stark contrast to the muralists.

Frida Kahlo was born in 1907, the year Rivera went to Europe as a young man. During her lifetime she was dwarfed literally and figuratively by her imposing husband. It wasn’t until after her death in 1954 at age 47, that she became the iconic figure she is today — representing women’s strength, pain, fortitude, perseverance, endurance.

1953 self-portrait, injured areas in 1925 accident, 22 lifetime operations

We revere her because her art is self-expression. She painted emotion and the internal life. She was a participant, not an observer. She hid her deformities under extraordinary handmade Mexican clothing — popularizing the style, corseted beneath to hold her injured spine erect. Andre Breton called her surrealist. We call her survivor.

Who needs feet when I have wings to fly
Juan O’Gorman designed Frida’s Casa Azul studio, a window on the garden

Our art history tour weaves the relationship between Diego and Frida with the times in which they lived and worked. We also examine the politics of Socialism and Communism in Mexico, how the Rivera’s gave sanctuary to Leon Trotsky, the idealism of young American artists like Pablo O’Higgins, Isamu Noguchi, and the Greenwood sisters — Marion and Grace, who were drawn to the movement. We see their deteriorating murals in an obscure market blocks from the city center.

Murals behind the chicharrones, Abelardo Rodriguez Market
Water-damaged, deteriorating Pablo O’Higgins mural, Mexico City
Frida’s last signed painting before she died, 1954

We understand Mexico more now, how the creative stream of artistic energy here continues to express social and political inequalities, injustices, and discontent.

Manuel Rodriguez Lozano 1945 mural, The Holocaust, at Downtown
Lunch break at Restaurant El Mayor, poached salmon with fresh corn salsa

Here in Oaxaca, our beloved Maestro Francisco Toledo, carried the mantle of social justice art until he died in September 2019. Young graphic artists follow in the footsteps of the masters, use wood, linoleum block and metal plates to carve out images of truth to power. Mexico offers creative opportunity to any and all who choose to express themselves.

Our October 2019 group at Casa Azul
Beneath Metropolitan Cathedral lies unexcavated Aztec city

Note: If you put together a group of 5-6 people, I am happy to organize this experience over a long weekend in Mexico City.

Diego Rivera’s experiment with Cubism, 1910-1920
Sculptor/muralist Isamu Naguchi is ardent anti-Fascist, installation
at Abelardo Rodriguez Market

Pablo O’Higgins and Mexican Muralism: A Weekend in Mexico City

Mexico City is Number One on the New York Times recommended travel destinations. CDMX has it all, they say, and I agree. This is probably the tenth time I’ve been here in the last two years for the art history study tour I organize, Looking for Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera.

New Dates: June 30-July 3, 2016 AND September 1-4, 2016  send me an email  norma.schafer@icloud.com

Pablo O'Higgins self-portrait, and portrait of his wife Maria in background

Pablo O’Higgins self-portrait, and portrait of his wife Maria in background

I always stay in the Centro Historico around the Zocalo where it is safe, pedestrian friendly, filled with art and archeology treasures and amazing restaurants with innovative menus. First-time visitors say they join me on this study tour as an orientation to one of the biggest cities in the world.

O’Higgins mural at Abelardo Rodriguez Market

Important and well-known CDMX destinations are the Diego Rivera murals in the Palacio Nacional and Bellas Artes. Few dig deeper into the murals at the Secretariat de Educacion Publico (SEP) and the Mercado Abelardo Rodriguez.

Figure, Pablo O'Higgins mural, Abelardo Rodriguez Market

Figure, Pablo O’Higgins mural, Abelardo Rodriguez Market

The Rivera murals at SEP were among his first after returning from European art study for over ten years. These were painted between 1923 and 1928.  Now famous, Rivera attracted a cadre of student assistants to sketch and paint.

Detail, mural sketch, with Francisco I. Madero and Miguel Hidalgo

Detail, mural sketch, with Francisco I. Madero and Miguel Hidalgo

One of these was Pablo O’Higgins, a 20-year old Utah-born American artist who was attracted to the ideals of the Mexican Revolution and migrated to Mexico City in 1924 where he became a student of Diego Rivera.

O'Higgins painted wood cabinet fronts for the Emiliano Zapata School

O’Higgins painted wood cabinet fronts for the Emiliano Zapata School

We search out O’Higgins frescoes at the Abelardo Rodriguez market. They are well-hidden in a not-so-easy-to-access patio in a colonial building next to the market. Rivera was offered a commission to paint the murals in this then new city market built in 1934. Too busy with other work, he proposed that his students do the project and agreed to supervise it.

O’Higgins was also a printmaker and co-founder of Taller de Graphica Popular, an artists’ print collective that created sociopolitical art to renounce fascism and imperialism. Mexico has a deep relationship with the graphic arts and it’s alive and well in both Mexico City and Oaxaca, today.

There are four large O’Higgins mural panels in this area that deserve attention, which is why it is included in our art history study tour. As a disciple of Rivera, O’Higgins learned from the master’s style and then created his own. Rivera said if he ever had a son, he wanted him to be like Pablo O’Higgins.

Mural detail, Abelardo Rodriguez Market

Mural detail, An Open Press, Abelardo Rodriguez Market

Today, while visiting the Museo Mural de Diego Rivera that holds the fresco Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in the Alameda, we were surprised with a special exhibition of Pablo O’Higgins’ work there, too. The second floor of the exhibition features a commentary about his work by art historians, fellow artists, and his wife Maria.

O'Higgins mural sketch

O’Higgins mural sketch

As one of Rivera’s top disciples, it’s fitting that O’Higgins is recognized with an exhibition in the Rivera mural museum. Perhaps the government will find a way to begin preserving his murals and those of the other students’ work at the market and other locations around the city.

Mural over arched doorway, Abelardo Rodriguez Market

Mural over arched doorway, Abelardo Rodriguez Market, corn and huitlacoche

Who painted at the Abelardo Rodriguez Market?

Market fresco themes were health, nutrition, quality organic food produced by labor recognized for their contributions to physical well-being, fair compensation and working conditions.

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