Diego Rivera was arguably one of the greatest and most renowned Mexican and World wide artists of the 20th Century. For at least sixty years, Dolores (“Lola”) Olmedo did not have the slightest doubt about who the greatest painter of the twentieth century was. It was not the Frenchman Matisse, not the Spaniard Picasso, but the Mexican Diego Rivera. Unlike most of his peers Diego used a wide variety of mediums, oil painting, watercolor paintings, pastel and crayon drawing, pencil drawings, and lithographs, charcoal, tile, mosaic, stones, etc.
Diego was a leader in the Mexican mural movement believing art should serve the working people, not just the wealthy and so he became interested in frescos where he took the art outdoors where everyone could enjoy them. Diego represented the working class people, painting murals on public buildings with narratives of the story and history of his native country.
Rivera is credited with the frescos painting art revival in Latin America and the United States, in modern time. Rivera and the Mexican Muralist Movement also provided the first inspiration for Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s “Works Progress Administration” (WPA) program in depicting scenes of American life on public buildings.
The US Federal Arts Program was first suggested to Roosevelt by George Biddle, who studied with Rivera. In a letter to Roosevelt, Biddle suggested that a group of muralists work on the new Justice Department Building in Washington, D.C. Biddle’s suggestion helped to develop the Public Works of Art Project.
One of his first frescos in Mexico was a work at the National Preparatory School in 1922, at which time Frida Kahlo was a student there. He went on to paint a series of frescos for the Ministry of Education, and one at the National Agriculture School.
He worked in a modernist artistic style and is best known for his powerful, politically charged public murals painted on the architecture and walls of Mexico and the United States. He is one of “Los Tress Grandes” of Mexican modernism, along with Josè Clemente Orzoco and David Alfaro Siqueiros creating artwork with revolutionary, politically leftist themes. Diego was both talented and politically controversial, refusing to separate his political message from his work. He was more socialist while Siqueiros was an open communist.
One example of this took place in New York where he worked on the RCA mural, entitled "Man at Crossroads” looking with hope and high vision to the choosing of a new and better future. Abby A. Rockefeller visited the mural site and praised the section depicting the Soviet May Day demonstrations. Rockefeller asks Rivera to replace the face of Lenin with that of an anonymous individual. Rivera offers to substitute Abraham Lincoln and the other 19th century North American figures for a group opposite Lenin. The RCA dismisses Rivera. The RCA mural is covered with canvas painted to match the adjoining blank wall, destroying the mural. Later Rivera signs a contract to reproduce a smaller version of the RCA murals on a wall at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico.
During the late 1930s and early 1940s, Rivera failed to get more commissions in the United States because he was regarded as being too radical. At this time he also lost favor among the Mexican Communist Party because of his support of Trotsky who was the communist exiled in México leader of the USSR opposite to Lennin. In 1947 he painted “Dream of a Sunday Afternoon” in Almeda Park for the Hotel del Prado in Mexico City. His largest mural, a work depicting the history of Mexico for the National Palace in Mexico City, was unfinished when Rivera died November 25, 1957.
Upon the invitation of his life-long friend Dolores, Rivera resided at her Acapulco residence for 18 months in which time he constructed 5 spectacular mosaic murals as his show of appreciation and adoration for Olmedo. Dolores commissioned a 3,000+ square foot studio to be built especially for Diego Rivera upon his return from Russia. This studio houses one of his most beautiful and touching murals, which has rarely been seen by the outside world. During his residency, he also painted numerous vivid ocean sunsets as well as portraits of Dolores and her children. The “House of the Winds” is the last privately owned property to house murals by Diego Rivera. The estate is a registered historic landmark that sits high above the Pacific Ocean with panoramic views of Acapulco and its bays.
A Brief Chronology of his life and achievements can be viewed at www.diegorivera.com