De Anza College s1

DE ANZA COLLEGE

ICS 5/ ARTS 2F

ARTISTS FOR THE PEOPLE

ARTISTS OF THE MEXICAN REVOLUTION

Fall of Tenochititlan 1520

Was probably the single most significant event in the history of Mexico. It changed political power of the ruling class completely.

Land ownership,

religion,

laws,

language,

customs.

Introduced European

diseases,

plants – wheat, mustard plants

animals – horses, cattle, sheep

ironworking – guns, shoes for horses, wheel technology, harnesses

economy – Cortez gave land to his soldiers as pay. They became the landowners; the

Indians who once owned the land became the peons who worked the land for the

European landlord. – In 300 years the culture is fixed into ethnic divisions of very rich and

very poor.

Templo Mayor contains two shrines to Tlaloc (Water) and Huitzilopochtli (War and Sun).

Quetzalcoatl, honored in the round shrine, is the main deity of the Toltecs. Aztec descendants continued to give him a special place of distinction.

Aztec kings derived their power from the fact that they are all descended from one Toltec prince Acamapichtli. (A.D. 1372) In the next 200 years, Aztec rulers consolidated their state and constantly pushed into new territory to make war and bring home captives for sacrifice.

Agriculture – Chinampa System - Floating Gardens of Xocamilco in Mexico City are remnants of that agricultural system and Lake Texcoco.

Toltec – reproduction of a section of the Coatepantli or “Wall of Serpents” at Tula.

Facsimile Codex Borbonicus – Preconquest or early Colonial – Quetzalcoatl & Tezcatlipoca (Smoking Mirror) God of the Underworld.

Human skull covered with turquoise, obsidian and pyrite.

Diego Rivera – Market Place at Tenochititlan, 1942

Jean Charlot – “Fall of Tenochititlan” ca. 1940’s.

National Cathedral in the Zocalo, Mexico City. Picture taken 1974

Bricks used to build the cathedral are bricks from destroyed Aztec temples

Cathedral sinks ca. 1” per century.

Represents the physical destruction of the old cultures, languages, customs and loss of

identity for the Indian cultures contacted by the Spanish.

Jose Guadalupe Posada d. 1913

Schooled in Western European artistic tradition –

Graphic artist who made etchings for song covers, theatre programs and newspapers.

Most famous for his newspaper “cartoons” called “broadsides”

1. His cartoons/images reached a huge population because they are circulated in the newspaper.

2. He used satire and underground humor to represent Dictator Diaz in the 1890’s.

3. He is considered to be responsible for keeping the spirit of the revolution alive until it actually took place in 1910.

Themes – National Heros

Emilio Zapata 1910-1912

Madero and Followers (Madero lead the resistance of the revolution and entered

Mexico City victorious in June 1911.

Lino Zamora – much loved bull fighter.

Calavera Series

Calavera of Madero, 1910

Calavera del Gato Morrongo 1910

Calavera of Don Quixote

Calavera Catrina.

Calavera of Contemporary Newspaper journalists and sellers, 1889-1895.

Other Satires

Satire of the comet that appeared 1899 (Haley’s Comet).

The Disobedient Son – 1890’s

Great Fright; Apparition of Pachita the Nougat Vendor 1893

Serious Statements about:

Poverty Prevails, Inflated prices kept that way by the Diaz regime

Militant Diaz regime – Recruitment techniques of Diaz’s army 1895 – 1910

Revolutionary hanged by landowners 1910-1912.

Religous themes that contain Indian origins:

Amazing Miracle – 2nd Appearance of Our Lady of Guadalupe 1893

Pilgrims on the Way to Chalma – 1890’s

Posada was so popular that many artists copied him – see Calavera Zapatista. What about it is different from Posada’s work?

Diego Rivera 1886-1957 and Frida Kahlo ca. 1908-1954.

Frida as an ancestral Indian with Diego as a child.

Frida Succumbing

Diego

The Flower Vendor

Liberation of the Peon

Wall Mural in the National Palace 1929 – 1945

Mexican War of Independence

History of Mexico from the Fall of Tenochititlan to the Future,- 1935

Wall Mural – Hospital de la Raza 1953

The People’s Demand for Better Health

United States Murals –

Pan American Unity, 1940, San Francisco City College

San Francisco Art Institute –

Detroit Art Institute – The Conveyor Belt – 1933

Jose Clemente Orozco

Epic of American Civilization: Hispano-America 1932-34

Hernando Cortez 1939

Jose Clemente Orozco con’t

Hidalgo, 1937

David Siqueiros 1898 – 198?

Polyform Cultural Center ca. 1972, Mexico City

Garden wall – Portraits of Mexico’s artists – Rivera, Orozco, Siqueiros, Posada, Mandez and Murillo known as Dr. Atl.

How do the themes and images differ from the Precolumbian frescoes that we have seen?