When Diego Rivera first saw these murals, he wept. The archeological discovery of Bonampak’s murals (of course, the local Lacondones always knew of them) was a wonderful find for Mexican and Mesoamerican history. The Temple of the Murals, done c. 790 A.D. for King Chan Muan to celebrate a military victory and show off his lineage of sons (all three shown dancing) was the missing link which proved what 20th century muralists, Rivera and Orozco, had been claiming. Mural painting was a native Mexican tradition of which they, the modern muralistas, were just the continuation.
The 20th century in Mexico began with revolution. One hundred years exactly after Father Hidalgo gave the Grito de Dolores to rally people to rebel against Spanish rule, Mexico once again reshaped itself. After ten years of upheaval, General Alvaro Obregón restored order, became president, and began to reunite the country. Part of his effort to do this involved creating a new identity for the Mexican people, one where their long history, culture, and values were shown and respected. To do this he called upon the great painters (in fact, Rivera was called to come back from Europe) to paint great murals to communicate to the populace the achievements of the revolution and call upon them to contemplate those achievements as well. These painters, known now as “Los tres grandes” (The Three Great Ones), were Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco, and David Alfaro Siquieros. These artists created a movement that not only shaped art in Mexico but also had a powerful influence in the U.S.
David Alfaro Siquieros (1896-1974), though raised by his conservative grandparents, was someone who supported the ordinary working man, even when it caused him to be imprisoned for severe criticism of the Mexican government (1960-64). Though he was originally a friend of Diego Rivera, he broke off with the other artist, accusing him of being a sell-out, since Rivera became very famous painting murals in the U.S. for wealthy industrialists.
Siquieros was someone known to be an ideological absolutist, though at one point he was kicked out of the Communist Party. However, in later years (1967) he would win the Lenin-Stalin Peace Prize. His focus in painting was the use of the whole body when painting, as though painting were a sacred dance. This influenced Jackson Pollack, who became famous for his abstract expressionist drip paintings, which he worked upon while very physically moving about the painting.
In the piece above, one sees the grandness and force of Siquieros’ work. In this piece called La universidad al pueblo; el pueblo a la universidad (The University to the people; The People to the University), the forceful expression of those straight arms pointing forward with book and pens in hand gives one a good sense about the fierce determination of the artist to communicate the value of education to all who see this work.
José Clemente Orozco (1883-1949) came from a family that lived on the edge of poverty before the Mexican Revolution. As a teen, he was inspired by seeing a political cartoonist at work and became interesting in how art could communicate big ideas. He became a painter of caricatures, though he also painted pictures showing the misery of the life around him. It was a hard-scrabble life with little attention paid to his talent. Unfortunately, life was made even harder when in 1904 to celebrate Mexican Independence Day, a fireworks mixture exploded damaging his left hand. The lack of immedidate medical attention left amputation as the only solution to save his life from the effects of gangrene.
For a short while in the early 1920s, he painted murals as part of the literacy campaign to help the Mexican people understand the effects of the revolution they had been through. However, he ultimately decided to go to the U.S. where he painted murals in Pomona College and the 24 panel piece called The Epic of American Civilization for Dartmouth College. Through his efforts in the U.S., he was able to return to Mexico in 1934 as a well-established artist.
Once in Mexico again, he created The People and Its Leaders for the Government Palace in Guadalajara, in his native state of Jalisco. His masterpiece would have to be the frescoes inside Guadalajara’s Hospicio Cabañas, which focus on the history of Mexico from pre-Columbian times through the Revolution.
That work is known as “The Sistene Chapel of the Americas” and the Hospicio is itself a UNESCO World Heritage Site. He was a driving force in reviving fresco painting, claiming as did Diego Rivera that mural painting was a native art form in Mexican culture.
The name Diego Rivera (1886-1957) is as momumental as the man was in physical size. Over six feet tall and weighing several hundreds of pounds, he was a towering figure, who saw in the mural painting of the Italian Renaissance, a period known for its gigantic frescoes, a tool that he could use to express his ideas on Mexican history in a format that he also felt was something native to Mexican culture. Having studied in Europe where he got to know many of the most famous painters of the 20th century, he returned to Mexico at the behest of the Mexican government to paint murals that helped redefine Mexican identity.
Rivera went to the U.S. in the 1930s where he had great success painting gigantic, epic paintings. Since the 1930s was a period in the U.S. when there were many public works sponsored by the government, Rivera’s work influenced many American painters. His own works appear in a number of cities, including inside the San Francisco Art Institute in the Diego Rivera Gallery. His commercial success prompted a falling-out with his friend and fellow muralista Siquieros, who felt Rivera had put his art in service to the bourgeoisie.
Photo credit ordovasart.com
This painting has a fascinating history not just because it gives Rivera’s idea on the panorama of Mexican history, but because the physical painting itself has had an interesting journey. I was fortunate enough in the 1970s to see this painting in its original location, the Hotel del Prado, which is near the Alameda Park in Mexico City. It is 52 feet long, as you can see at diegorivera.org, and it is overwhelming, as befits such an intense combination of characters representing a turbulent history. And yes, it was in a hotel. However, not unlike Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper, which graced a dining hall in a monastery, when both buildings were destroyed (WWII bombs for the monastery and the 1985 earthquake for the hotel), the last things standing were the two paintings. The Universe obviously appreciates art. The mural is now in the Museo Mural, which is next to the Alameda, the park where Rivera’s panorama of characters representing Mexico and its culture haunt the spirit of the place.
While we normally think of movie stars as having legendary, tempetuous love lives, these two artists stand toe-to-toe with Taylor and Burton when it comes to drama, private and public. Their relationship, in which they finally wound up living in two separate houses that were joined (in Puerto Vallarta, Taylor and Burton had two houses joined by a bridge), will be the subject of the next post on Of Art and Wine that will look at how they each handled a very special painting subject. For now, it can be said that along with his fellow muralistas, Rivera revived the painting of frescoes in modern architecture. Rivera in particular is also famous for using modern figures and imagery to express Mexican history and cultural identity, and perhaps he was right when he claimed that mural painting is an art native to Mexico.
So we return to those murals in Bonampak. King Chan Muan’s celebration of his lineage on the finely painted walls of The Temple of Murals did not secure its continued existence. By 820 A.D., just 30 years after this great show of power and ostentation, Bonampak, along with the rest of the Classical Maya sites were abandoned to the forest. However, his temple murals with walls that often sparkle with the subtle blue of azurite from far-off Arizona passed the torch from Mexico’s distant past to its modern manifestation of mural painting.
Images are either in public domain or used in accordance with Fair Use Policy for purposes of critique, review, and discussion.
Sources for this article:
“José Clemente Orozco,” biography.com
“Jose Clemente Orozco,” artnet.com
“Diego Rivera, his Life and Art,” diegorivera.org
“Diego Rivera,” biography.com
“David Alfaro Siquieros” theartstory.org
“David Alfaro Siquieros,” famouspainters.net
Marjorie Vernelle is an artist, writer, college professor, and traveler. For more see the Pages at ofartandwine.com. Her author page is at amazon.com and her art at Vernelle Art Boutique vernellestudio.com.
Wine in Baja California
It was Juan de Grijalva, one of Hernán Cortez’s men, who first lifted a glass of wine with some of Montezuma’s emissaries, and thus Mexico’s on again, off again relationship with wine began. If you have read the Of Art and Wine piece “Bonampak’s Temple of the Murals and Mayan Drinks” ofartandwine, then you know that the Maya had their own wonderful drinks made of fragrant hibiscus and other tropical ingredients. In fact, grapes did grow in pre-Columbian Mexico, but they seem to have been strongly acidic, though the juice was combined with honey and fruits to create something tolerable to the taste.
In this 18th century version of a painting done in the 1500s, one sees the stern stuff that this infamous conquistador was made of. As wine was a part of Spanish culture, it traveled on the ships that came to the New World. Along with the conquistadores came the different Catholic religious orders, among them the Franciscans and Dominicans, who of course used wine for sacramental purposes, but also to make money.
At first the cultivation of grapes and making of wine was something encouraged by King Charles I, as the new Spanish arrivees found it necessary and economical to grow their own grapes and make wine. Cortez, himself, commanded that thousands of acres of vineyards be created. The planting of the vineyards served to turn the dry desert landscape into useable land. There was even the creation of a variety of grape called, liked the Spanish who were born in the New World rather than in Spain, Creole (criollo). However, that was not to last, as by the time of King Charles II, Spain feared that the production of the New World vineyards would undercut the prices of the wines made in Spain. Cultivation of the grape was forbidden, except for strictly religious ceremonial needs.
Mexico’s environment of which much is below the 30th degree parallel is not well suited to the growing of grapes. However, around 1843, Dominican monks found this wonderful place in the Baja Peninsula, which like the lands of Alta California (the California in the U.S.), had a climate that favored wine grapes. Its altitude, the evening fog and cool breezes from the Pacific, and the warm sunny days are as effective in La Baja as they are in La Alta when it comes to growing grapes.
The endeavor started well, but the grape vines were attacked by phylloxera, a fungus that nearly wiped out vineyards in Europe in the late 1800s. This was followed by the Mexican Revolution, which was 10 years of upheaval and instability. The industry tried to struggle back into existence in the 1920s, but the lack of wine-making knowledge and proper equipment created wines that were yellow, acidic, and not particularly appealing. It was not until the 1970s when Pedro Domecq, a maker of some of the very finest brandy, revived high-end wine from the Valle de Guadalupe.
These days, along with its booming brandy production (Mexico’s Emperador is the world’s largest company producing brandy), the country produces wines of better and better quality. Mostly blends of various grapes from Europe, these wines are beginning to make their mark in the world of wine. Gardiner Navarro in his article, “Mexican Wine is Getting More Popular – And a Lot Better” (barrons.com) states, “In Mexico’s west coast, Valle de Guadalupe (or Valle, as locals call it) has recently emerged as one of the most exciting up-and-coming wine destinations.” Its close proximity to San Diego, only a 2-hour trip, has caused a small wine tourist industry to spring up. There are day trips that leave the wonderful, colorful San Diego Train Station at 9:00 am and return the visitors there by 8:00 pm. the same day (sandiegowineytours.com). However, there are tours for those who want to spend a couple of days in this peaceful valley. Baja Wine Tours offers private and public tours of varying lengths, again from San Diego. Consult their website for some wonderfully enticing photos of the Valle de Guadalupe and its offerings, including glorious food.(bajawinerytours.com).
In speaking about food and wines, Baja produces some very nice Chardonnay. It also produces Temperanillo, which goes so very well with the earthy flavor of tamales. This brings up the topic of food pairings of Mexican food and wines from any of the wine growing regions of the world. One might normally think of a cold beer or a frosty, salty margarita to go with Mexican food. However, enchiladas go very nicely with Riesling; carnitas with Pinot Noir; Pinot Gris with chicken tacos; sparkling wines with cerviche, and Syrah with mole. While Baja may not produce all of those wines – yet, it certainly is coming up in the world of wine. Keep your eye on the Mexican wine industry.
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©marjorie vernelle 2022
Coming Soon: Frida and Diego: Art, Love, and Watermelons, plus Wines for Valentine’s.
Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera were rock stars before Rock. Kahlo, first seen as just “the wife of Rivera” turned out to be one of the most notable female artists in history. Rivera, famous for his grand murals and their influence on painting among artists in the U.S., was the great love and bain of Kahlo’s existence. Star-crossed, perhaps, their final communication to one another was in the form of paintings of watermelons. And for the rest of us lovers, some suggestions for wine to serve or give on Valentine’s.
