Diego rivera small biography

Diego Rivera, a memorable figure in 20th-century art, actively painted during the 50 years from 1907 to 1957. Mexican by birth, Rivera spent a good portion of his adult life in Europe and the United States as well as in his home in Mexico City. Early in his career, he dabbled in Cubism and later embraced Post-Impressionism, but his unique style and perspective are immediately recognizable as his own. He was involved in the world of politics as a dedicated Marxist and joined the Mexican Communist Party in 1922. He hosted Russian exile Leon Trotsky and his wife at his home in Mexico City in the 1930s. Lived in unsettled times and led a turbulent life, Diego Rivera, widely known for his Marxist leanings, along with Marxism Revolutionary Che Guevara and a small band of contemporary figures, has become a countercultural symbol of 20th century and created a legacy in the art that continues to inspire the imagination and mind.

Diego Rivera's Early Years: 1886-1915

The artist and his twin brother were born in 1886 in Guanajuato, Mexico. His twin died at the age of two, and the family moved to Mexico City shortly thereafter. His parents encouraged Diego's artistic talent, enrolling him in the San Carlos Academy of Fine Arts when he was approximately 12 years old. There, he studied traditional painting and sculpting techniques under the tutelage of a largely conservative faculty. Gerardo Murillo was among his fellow students at the academy, an artist who would become a driving force behind the Mexican Mural Movement in the early 20th century, in which Rivera took part. In 1905, the two students joined a group of other up-and-coming artists in an exhibition organized by the editors of Savia Moderna magazine.

Rivera completed his studies in 1905, and the following year, he exhibited more than two dozen paintings at the annual San Carlos Academy art show. One of his works from this time, "La Era," or "The Threshing," displays elements of I

(1886-1957)

Who Was Diego Rivera?

Now thought to be one of the leading artists of the 20th century, Diego Rivera sought to make art that reflected the lives of the Mexican people. In 1921, through a government program, he started a series of murals in public buildings. Some were controversial; his Man at the Crossroads in New York City's RCA building, which featured a portrait of Vladmir Lenin, was stopped and destroyed by the Rockefeller family.

Early Life

Rivera was born on December 8, 1886, in Guanajuato, Mexico. His passion for art emerged early on. He began drawing as a child. Around the age of 10, Rivera went to study art at the San Carlos Academy of Fine Arts in Mexico City. One of his early influences was artist José Posada who ran a print shop near Rivera's school.

In 1907, Rivera traveled to Europe to further his art studies. There, he befriended many leading artists of the day, including Pablo Picasso. Rivera was also able to view influential works by Paul Gaugin and Henri Matisse, among others.

Famous Muralist

Rivera had some success as a Cubist painter in Europe, but the course of world events would strongly change the style and subject of his work. Inspired by the political ideals of the Mexican Revolution (1914-15) and the Russian Revolution (1917), Rivera wanted to make art that reflected the lives of the working class and native peoples of Mexico. He developed an interest in making murals during a trip to Italy, finding inspiration in the Renaissance frescos there.

Returning to Mexico, Rivera began to express his artistic ideas about Mexico. He received funding from the government to create a series of murals about the country's people and its history on the walls of public buildings. In 1922, Rivera completed the first of the murals at the Escuela Nacional Preparatoria in Mexico City.

Commercial Success

In the 1930s and '40s, Rivera painted several murals in the United States. Some of his works created controversy,

The public persona of Diego Rivera and the heroic status bestowed upon him in Mexico was such that the artist became the subject of myth in his own lifetime. His own memories, as recorded in his various autobiographies, have contributed to his image as a precocious child of exotic parentage, a young firebrand who fought in the Mexican Revolution, and a visionary who completely repudiated his participation in the European avant-garde to follow a predestined course as the leader of Mexico's art revolution.

The facts are more prosaic. The product of a middle-class family, the young artist completed an academic course of training at the prestigious Academic course of San Carlos before leaving Mexico for the traditional period of European study. During his first stay abroad, like many other young painters, he was greatly influenced by Post-Impressionists Paul Cezanne, Van Gogh, and Gauguin. As for participating in the early battles of the Mexican Revolution, recent research would seem to indicate that he did not. Although he was in Mexico for a time in late 1910-early 1911, his tales of fighting with the Zapatistas cannot be substantiated.

From the summer of 1911 until the winter of 1920, Rivera lived in Paris. This period of his career has been brilliantly illuminated by Ramon Favela in the 1984-85 exhibition "Diego Rivera: The Cubist Year." The work of these years reveals diverse influences, from the art of El Greco and new applications of mathematical principles, in which Rivera had been well schooled at San Carlos, to subject matter and techniques that reflect the discussions on the role of art in the service of the revolution that preoccupied the community of emigre artists in Montparnasse.

During this time period, Diego Rivera left Spain for a long tour in France, Belgium, Holland and England hoping to solve a problem he couldn't really define. He admired greatly the work of Breughel, Hogarth and Francisco Goya. He wished