Rivera [Hardcover]

Diego Rivera (18861957)is a loud presence on the art historical stage. With devout political principles and a turbulent romantic history, he was at once husband and paladin of Frida Kahlo, advocate and adversary of Stalins Soviet Union, and liberator and traitor of Leon Trotsky.

Vibrant, graphic, and often monumental, Riveras paintings carry the same live political and passionate charge as his personal biography. Fusing European influences such as Cubism with a socialist ideology and anexaltation of Mexicos indigenous and popular heritage, he created a new iconography for art history and for his country. He became one of the most important figures in theMexican mural movementand won international acclaim for his public wall paintings, in which he presented autopian yet accessible vision of a post-revolutionary Mexico. In 1931, Rivera was thesubject of MoMAs second ever monographic exhibition.

This book explores theunique blend of influence and ideologywhich secure Riveras place as both a unique and a universal painter, bound to the particular turbulent experience of early 20th century Mexico, and yet preoccupied with subjects such asrevolution and class inequitywhich continue to speak to us today.

BAPainter, Marxist activist, and husband of Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera is renowned as much for his active politics as for his monumental mural paintings. This introduction explores his unique and visionary renderings of a modern Mexico, combining communist passion, pre-Columbian heritage, and the influences of European modernism.