Diego Rivera ( de A go rih VEH ruh) was born in
Guanajuato, Mexico
in 1886. He had a twin brother, but his brother died when he was only a
year and a half old. When he was six years old Diego's family moved to
Mexico City.
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He enrolled in evening art classes at the Academy of
San Carlos, but
was later expelled for participating in student revolts at the school.
When he was thirteen his father enrolled him in a military academy, but
that only lasted two weeks, and he enrolled in regular classes. These
experiences were only the beginning of the controversy which would
surround Rivera all his life.
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Later he went to Spain where he was awarded a four
year scholarship to
study art in Europe. He made various trips to France, Belgium, Holland,
and Great Britian until finally settling in Paris in 1911.
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Diego Rivera became director of the Academy of San
Carlos in 1929. He
is noted for the murals he painted. These were large paintings which
covered walls of buildings. Because of his political views, some of his
murals were not accepted by the people. The city of Detroit
commissioned him to paint a mural for the garden court of the Detroit
Institute of Art. In the mural he placed a picture of Lenin, Communist
leader in Russia. Nelson Rockefeller asked him to replace the picture
of Lenin with another face, but Diego refused. He offered to put a
picture of Lincoln on the other side of the mural, but that offer was
refused by the art institute. They covered up the mural so people
couldn't view it, and the next year it was destroyed. Rivera later
painted a smaller version of the same mural in Mexico City.
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Fourteen years later he painted another controversial
mural in Mexico
for the Hotel del Prado. He included in it words denying the existence
of God. Because of the scandal that occurred, the public was not
allowed to view it for nine years.
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Four years after that incident he made a mural in
Mexico in which
he painted Stalin accompanied by Mao Tsetung (MAH oh DZUH DOONG),
Chinese Communist leader. Officials removed it from the building.
Rivera was a member of the Communist party the last thirty years of his
life, but his insistence on promoting his political views did not set
well with the people of Mexico and the United States who commissioned
him to paint murals for them.
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Rivera had many women in his life. He had a son and a
daughter by two
different women. Then he married Guadalupe Marin and they had a
daughter. That marriage ended and he married Frida Kahol. They divorced
and remarried. After her death he married Emma Hurtado, who was his art
dealer.
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He died of heart failure at the age of seventy-one.
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In our featured painting The Flower Carrier
notice
the bold, bright colors he uses. With the use of shadows he makes the
subject stand out from the background of the painting almost as if the
figures are outlined. How does he repeat the colors? Compare the size
of the man to the size of the woman. The man is carrying the heavy
load, but he appears to be a smaller person than the woman putting the
load on his back.
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