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Inthis detail from a Diego Rivera fresco (see page 4), theMexican muralist has playfully painted his self-portrait with hisback to his audienc.e

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REVOLUTIONARY IMAGESTHREE GREAT MEXICAN MURALISTS TELL A REBEL'S STORY IN THREE DIFFERENT WAYS

he revolution that took place in Mexico during the early 20th century brought chaos and violence to that country. But it also inspired the talents of three of the century's most important visual artists.

Ever since Mexico won its independ ence from Spain in 1821, the count ry had been in turmoil. The latest civil war-c alled the MexicanRevolution (1910- 20 )- haJ just e nded, and the current leaders wan t·

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ed to calm and reassure a terrified population. To do this and to ex plain the revolution's meaning, in 1921 the government began com missioning Mexican painter· to create huge murals in public places. The most important of t hese artists were Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco (O -ROWS-l o), and David Si4ueiros (See-KER-os). Each had his own idea of what had happened during the revolution, and st rong feelings as to whether it was g(x)d or bad.

Emiliano Zapata (Emil-YANO Za-PA-ta) was a leade r who wa

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killed during the war. He was a hero to some, a violent revolutionar') to others. Because he had become such a powerful sy mbol of the ren )· lunon, Zapata was the su bject of many important murals. He ts een very differently in each of the works :-ho wn here.

Diego Rivera, considered the leadt::r of the

muralist mm·ement, believed in the revolution. He wanted his art to explain what he felt had taken place d uring the st ruggle. Rivera also wanted to cncounige the Mexican people to take pride in their heritage. In his portrait of Zapata (opposite page, bottom), Rivera uses the kind of flattened, styl ized figures with masklike faces set m shallow spaces that can be see n in ancient pre-Columbian* art. Zapata and hi:. supporters are dressed in white and carry fann tools. The soft lighting, muted colors, and simpli; fied overlapping shapes in this work describe a scene that is anything hut warlike. Defined by curved organic outlines , these idealized citizen solJiers stand firm. Grasping his sugarcane-cutter's knife and the white horse he has taken from the enem y, Rivera's Zapata see1n, determined to do anything for the good of h is people.

Jose C le mente Orozco also pain ted Zapata , hut his version(opposite page, top right) is very different from Rivera's. Seen froma low point-o;f view, the revolutionary leader's dark silhouetted shape is framed in the doorway of a small pea'lant h ue. He looms h igh in the background, casting a shadow over the fright

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ened people in the foreground. Zapata's static, exr,ressionli::ss figure stands m sharp contrast to the thrashing, intersecting diagonals and frag-

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How is Mexican revoluitonary lead er Emiliano Zapata being presented in each of these three scenes? Does he seem like a hero... or a villain?

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mented body parts that define the suffering peasant s. Orozco's use of angular, pointed shapes, harsh spotlight ing, dark reds and browns, and slashing brushst rokes further expresses his less-than-positive view of Zapata and the Mexican Revolution.

Muralist David Siqueiros took a very active pare in therevolution. A protester and soldier, he was expelled from Mexico for his radical politica l beliefs. T he yea rs he spe nt as a politi ca l prisoner are expre ssed in paintings such as Zapata (to p , left). Although this work is supposed to rep resent th e revo lutionary leader, it also is a self-portrait.Siqueiros was so commi tted to the revolution that , in this work, he iden tifies with one of its most famous legends.The tightly cropped head, seen in close-up, is clamped between two cement block walls. Presentin g the walls in extreme perspective heightens the feeling that the sub ject is trap ped in a windowless, airtight cell.

MARCH 2008 • SCHOLASTIC ART 3

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This fresco (a mural painted on fresh plaster) by Diego Rivera shows the variousgroupsof artists and workers involvedin the

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"I WANT MY MURALS TO REFLECT THE LIFE OF THE MEXICAN PEOPLE, AS IT WAS AND IS NOW."-DIEGO RIVERA

DIEGO RIVERA e

T here are many ways totell a visual story, an<lMexican muralist Diego

Rivera used a number of them.One method of storytelling

is to <livi<le the narrative into separate self-contained panels, like those in a comic book or agraphic novel. Rivera <li<l this in his work The Making of a Fresco

(cover and above) at the San Francisco Art l nstitute. Rather than pre*nting a series of events chat happen over time, the panels are related to one another bysubject. Each section shows a different kind of la horer-<: onst ruc tion workers, engineers, architects-all working on the same projec t at the same time. And the whole mural is tied together by the very realistic-lookin g painted scaf fold. It seems to cover the mural, framing and focusing attention on the artists in the center. They arc "painting" a mural within the larger mural, the subject of which isa giant standing worker dressed in blue. Located in the exact center of the symmetrical composition is rhe larger mural 's focal point, the artist himself.

4 SCHOLASTIC ART • 2008

Diego Rivera, considered hy many to be the most im portant of rhe Mexican muralists, was a large man with equally gran<l opinions. It was rypical of him to rum his hacl on his crit ics, a.'> literally he does in the work above. Rivera, the son of two schoolteachers, was bom in 1886 in a small mining rown. I le went to art school in Mexico City and at 19 was awarded a government travel grant.He studied for several years in Europe, where he admired the 16th-century frescos of artists such as Leomrdo <la Vinci (see pages 12-13). When he retumed to Mexico in 1921, Rivera combined the realism anJ :.calc of Renais sance figures with pre-Columbian suhiects and styles.The artist wanted his art to idealize the ordinary Mexi can people and to celel-,rate their Indian heritage. Later, Rivera married artist Frida Kahlo and became part of a group of artists, writers, and politicians who helped shape Mexican culture in the 1930s and 1940:..

One of Rivera's major projects was a series of wall murab (opposite page, top) painted in Mexico City's National Palace. In this detail, two grours of native peo ples meet in otJer to trade. This visual story can he read somet hing like a book. Beginning with the group on the left, che viewer's eye progresses horizontally across the

Diego Rivera often let a building's

architectureinspire hisdesign, as he did when painting this sun.

• This careful reconstrcu· tion of a pre-Columbiancity represents an idealized view of Mexico before it was occupied by the Spanish.

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fo reground , from detail to overlapping detail. It moves past the masked Aztec priest to the emblems carriedby the group on the righ t. The viewer's attention then moves up the diagonals formed by the spears to the danc ing figures in the middle ground, finally focusing on the giant triangular pyramid in the backgro und.

Because murals are actually part of a building's archi -

tec t ure, they tell their visual srories in a physicallyin volving way. Many of Rivera's murals in the National Palace wind up staircases, burst around corners, or are tucked into closets. In this small paint ing (near left}, a circular window has become the center of a blazing sun. TI1e natural sunlight coming through the window he igh t ens the impact of the painted sun around it. Its light shines down on the vertical rows of com heing fertilized by the horizo ntal bodies of two dead revolut ionaries.

In the works of Mexican muralists such as Rivera, nearly everything - including the seasons, the cycles of nature, even life and death- relates directly to the Mexi can Revolution. Rivera was at work on another mural series based on the revolut ion when he died in 1957.

MARCH 2008 • SCHOLASTIC ART 5

- - - - -

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"I WANT THE VIEWER AND MY WORKTO BECOME ONE AND THE SAME."-DAVID SIQUEIROS

DAVID SIQUEIROSBre J{inc Baun

ari•eshe youngest and mosr radical of the Mexican muralists was David Alfaro Siqueiros. He thought that a mural was not just an image to be painted

on a wall; it had to be incorporated with the character of the building. Siqueiros wanted to create an interactive environment that would surround the onlooker and make the viewer a part of the mural.

Siqueiros was born in 1896 into a well-to-do and cul tured family. His mother was a poet, his father a lawyer. A-,; a teenage r, he took classes wit h Orozco until the Mexican Revolution interrupted his studies. He joined.,. "The artist must paint as he the army, and that experi- speaks. I don't want people to ence caused him to begin speculate on what I mean. I want viewing art as a meansthem to undrestand." of social change. After- David Siqueiros

the revolution ended, he,6 SCHOLASTIC ART • 2008

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murals that later would become world-famous.Siqueiros's art was a direct result of his political beliefs.

He was an activist, protester, union official, and strike organizer- activir ies that frequently resulted in jail sen tences. The artist wanted the viewer to he as involved in his political convictions as he was.

One of Siqueiros's best-known murals {above) is in a

heroes. Siqueiros's use of extreme angles, sweeping diagonals, and vivid colors also helps to convey the artist's urgent desire for political reform.

In addirion to his

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palace outside Mexico City. The artist partially knocked down a wall between two rooms so his mural would protrude into the viewer's space. The story, executed in multiple changing perspective, alters as the visitor moves from right co left. le starts with the 1906 miners' strike that began the revolution. Stylized, expressionless, diagonal figures defined by multipl e, parallel "lin es of force" re-create the feeling of a crowd surging forward.

As the observer moves left, the strikers gradua lly dis solve into life-size, ve rtical revolutionari es who appear to march toward the viewer. When the spectator passes the sha llow wall dividing the space, the perspective changes again. Now the focus is on a single larger-than-life horse man who symbolizes the power of the people. Distorted diagonals bring him to an abrupt halt, stopped by govern ment forces. To his left are the casualties of dictatorship, the repetitive horizontal line of fallen revolutionary

gigantic formats an<l unusual presentations, Siqueiros used other devices that were considered radical at the time.He worked with industrial paints, plastics, spray guns, and photomomage. He was also interested in the photographic technique used in the new art of motion pictures. In his self-portrait (opposite page, below), he has presented him self in extreme close up. His right arm fonns a dramatic diagonal that runs from one comer of the picture almostto the other. His hand is in sharp focus and also is radical ly foreshortened (much larger in scale, so it appears three dimensional). The artist has even put a thick texture of paint on his fingernails to increase the sense of reality anJ heighten his connection with the viewer.

Siqueiros continued to engage in radical activities an<l to c r eate images that supported his political beliefs. When he died in 1974, a fellow artist described him as "a great Mexican monument, as titanic as his paintings."

MARCH 2008 • SCHOLASTIC ART 7

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• • S C H O L A S T I C

M ASTERP I ECE

OF THE MONTH #5

hile Diego Rivera painted the Mexi can Revolution as a heroic epic, Davie.I Siqueiros an<l Jose Clemente Orozco

painted the reality of war. Born in 1883, Orozcost udied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Mexico City. W hen he was 17, the artis t lost his right hand and part of his vision in a lahoratory accident .Orozco was politically active Juring the revolution, an<l saw many of its horrors firsthand.

To tell his stories, Orozco has abandoned the logical progressio n am.I perspective (a system for representing deep space realistica lly}chat Rivera and Siqueiros used to tell their visual sto ries. lnsteatl, he chos e key moments in Mexico's history---one.s he believed represente<l the country's essence.

In this mural (rig ht) painted on the walls of the Government Palace, popular hero Father Miguel H idalgo (ee- DAL-go) urges the native people torise up against their Spanish conquerors.The priest is the center of the radial composition; all the other figures spiral out from this focal point. In this work Orozco uses d istortion, juxta position, and scale changes to create a night marish effect. Th e twisti ng diagonals seen in the tortured figures, the dark earth colors , and the slashing brus hst rokcs echo the conJitions under which most Mexican people lived in the early J9th cen t ury. The rurhu lent outer edges of the work are in sharp contrast toits center. Father Hidalgo's more realistically painted portrait is a visual symhol of reason and calm.

In his later years, O rozco became a national hero, rccognize<l as an outstanding Mexican figure in the arts and sciences. The artist died in 1949.

Father Hidalg,oa symbolof Mexican indepenednce, is considered a spiritualleader of the MexicanRevolution.Orozco planned compositions like thisone as part of a sequence.Each succeeding chapterwas painted on most surfaces(top,right) of an entirebuilding.

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MARCH 2008 • SCHOLASTIC ART-8•9

JOSE CLEMENTISweepinesiaieme,iis

OROZCO"A PAINTING SHOULD NOT BE

i A COMMENTARY, BUT THE FACTI ITSELF." -JOSE CLEMENTE OROZCO

M

ART SPOTLIGHT

STORIES FOR HE PEO LE

THREE MURALISTS SHARE VISUAL STORIESWITH THEIR COMMUNITIES

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"MAKING A MURAL IS LIKE A BIG MOVIE PRODUCTION-IT CAN INVOLVE 20 SETS OF SCAFFOLDINGS, 4 TRUCKS, AND FOOD FOR 50 PEOPLE." -JUDY BACA

TALES OF UNITYcxican-American artist Judy Baca workeJ with the communit') of Durango, Colorado, to create the mural above. The work is about

the relaciomhip between the town\ Native American Ute tribe anJ its Mexican and Caucasian resiJcnts, anJ the way in which they all interact with the land around them. To create this digital composition. Baca

collaged historical images of the town, family album photos, and

10 SCHOLASTIC ART • ZOOS

stuJcnt Jrawings, and adJ cd her own painted images . The sy mbolic U te "circle of life" in the ce nter connects all the elements. The styles the artist employs arc as diverse as her subjects. She uses multiple changing perspectives, overviews, close, ups, and many different scales. The viewer's gaze moves from the Ute mother and child (whose triangular form echoes the mountain ) in the backgrou nd to the figures in the middle ground to the close-up of a cowboy in the foregrou nd.

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STORIES OF PRIDEA in Atncan -American history. Like Om!co, Big

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"MY INTENTION IS TO PORTRAY WHAT IS INTRINSICALLY AFRICAN-AMERICAN." -JOHN BIGGERS

------ger:, ha ahandoned realism and con\'entional persrecti\'e. 1le has chosen to tdl his \'isual story hy wcanng together many separate events. The work' focal poinr in the center is a slaYc who is framed by the in tersecting diagonals of two strnctures. His strength and labo r support hoth. Heleans against the thri\'ing 'Tree of Life,'' which nurtures his

l larriet Tubman (c. 1820-1913) is eenfrom a low point of view as she guides a line uf overlap ping repeated figures to freedom. The symbolic ""forch of Freedom" tlrnt she carries topples thL· column. Biggers uses multiple perspectives and vanishing points in order to juxtapose many stories within a single composition.

"ART CAN TURN AN INVASIVE STRUCTURE INTO A GALLERY OF FREE SPEECH." -BANKSY

STATEMENTS OF SEPARATIONhat story dn you think this mural createJ hy cnntemporaryBritish street artist Banksy i:, telling? l\ies rheanswer become clean:'.r when you learn that it was painred on a 425-mile-long

wall that separates two oppc.bmg 1-,rroups, lsradis and Palestinians? Thi:, provocative image juxtaposes two n ry different painting tyle!,. Stenciled on the wall, the styli:ed forms of children appear to be phtying with huckets and shovels on top of a pile of rubble that looks like sand. Above them, a giant hole, seemingly blasted through tht! wall, reYeals a beautiful sun-drenched beach with palm trees and gentle waves. The island paraJu;e is depicted with photographically realistic detail. The bright blues and greens provide an alm\1:;t :,hocking contrast to the Jmb neutral tonesof the concrete wall. By presenting a symbolic image of e:;cape, Banksy's

mural makes a moving comment nn the tense.. Bri.sJlb 191? Un-nv.i. 2005.Coonsyoltht ·- polittcal situation in the M1dJle East.

MARCH 200B • SCHOLASTIC ART 11

people still in l:-,ondage on the left. The limb h1:hinJ h1:-. head has been cut off and replaced hy a plantation column syml-d1: ing slaver,•. On the nght, the