Saturday, 18 January 2014

May Day Procession - Diego Rivera 1956

Diego Rivera was born December 8, 1886, Guanajuato City, Guanajuato, Mexico. He remains one of the most famous Mexican painters of all time and worked as a painter and muralist in the early 20th century in the Americas as well as Europe. His connections introduced him to the world of surrealism and, from there, into the world of the avant garde European art scene, in which he eventually met Picasso. He followed Picasso into Cubism for a while, then studied renaissance art in Italy before returning to Mexico in the early 1920s.

This is a mural relating to the May Day Procession in Moscow an oil painting painted by Diego Rivera in 1956. The formal elements within this painting – the lines creating the curve outline of the path shows a continuous line in the foreground the depth of the curve is sharper but as it goes further into the background it gets finer. Perspective is the key in the painting not only creating depth but using the connection between the colours in the rally flags and the people carrying them. In the foreground a close up view of the rally flags showing an insight on the celebration happening whilst the background represents the sense of movement- Starting of small so the people looking squashed together and tight and slowly separating when getting to the front. The feeling/emotions within the painting can be the sense of joy and excitement but creating the feeling of peace. The clever idea of having the blue circular balloon ball 3d shaped looks like its rolling/being past down the rally the writing on their in different languages showing the different types of people trying to convey the feeling of togetherness and . Having the continuous rectangular sized banners lining up with the outline of the path increasing the size as it gets towards the front creates pattern. The tone starts of dull in the background but gradually gets brighter in the foreground showing the detail and more of an idea of what is happening.

The possible influences on the work would be the time period of when the Cold War was going in which told the story of two allies who defeated Hitler both sides tried to destroy each other but tried not to let it get to actual fighting. This was painted in relation to the war- Diego Rivera tried to convey the feeling of ‘peace’. Considering the artist himself Rivera was interested in the social problems and hardships of everyday life. 



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