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Cover: A Tourists’
Mexico 1936 Diego Rivera
Rivera satirizes the picturesque version of Mexico held by
tourists and foreign intellectuals.
Wearing
donkey heads, they are part of a false masquerade in which
the painter introduces a mockery of the Mexican ex-president
Plutarco Elias Calles in the guise of a Punchinello with a
tiger's head. The woman, top centre, is the journalist
Katherine Anne Porter
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 Trotskv and his wife at his home in
Mexico Citv 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 svmbol of 20th centurv and created a legacy
in the art that continues to inspire the imagination and
mind.
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