Viva Mexico, at Grand Palais

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Diego Rivera, Portrait of Adolfo Best Maugard 1913, Museo Nacional de Arte © Francisco Kochen

I went to Mexico for the first time at 40 and went five times the following three years such was my passion for this country which combines, music, sun, food, tequila, architecture and art. Anything about Mexico fascinates me and I thus rushed to the Grand Palais to discover the long awaited exhibition of art dedicated to 1900-1950 in Mexico, and its main artists Rivera, Kahlo and Orozco. The result was that there was sun, there was art but no fireworks ! as if the long wait (the exhibition was cancelled five years ago for diplomatic reasons) had weakened the show.

Frida Kahlo, The two Frida, Museo Nacional de Arte Moderno.© INBA, Museo de Arte Moderno © 2016 Banco de México Diego Rivera Frida Kahlo Museums Trust,

Frida Kahlo, “The two Frida”, Museo Nacional de Arte Moderno.

I loved discovering Rivera’s early paintings of Notre Dame cathedral in 1909, his cubist Zapatista landscape (1915) and his fabulous portrait of Adolfo Best Maugard (1913). Ramon Cano Manilla’s « Indian woman from Oaxaca » is striking as is David Altaro Siqueiros’s self portrait . Revolution and love and generous nature are constatntly intertwined in the paintings.

Diego Rivera, Zapatist landscape, 1915 Museo Nacional de Arte © 2016 Banco de México Diego Rivera Frida Kahlo Museums Trust

Diego Rivera, Zapatist landscape, 1915 Museo Nacional de Arte

All three artists and their contemporaries came to Paris at the beginning of the XX th century and were impregnated by the International current of cubism. Yet they were incredibly original and always kept their often dark and joyous Mexican character.

The show is both fascinating for the very important paintings by Diego Rivera, Roberto Montenegro and José Clemente Orozco that travelled to Paris and disappointing because the Mexican soul is absent. As if some cartesian mind had decided to calm the latin passion that you find everywhere in museums in D.F. , as Mexico city is called locally.

Tina Modotti, Guitar, bandolier and sickle, Museo Nacional de Arte © Francisco Kochen

Tina Modotti, Guitar, bandolier and sickle, Museo Nacional de Arte © Francisco Kochen

Photographers of course like Tina Modotti and Lola Alvarez Bravo (who was recently shown at Maison de l’Amérique latine) are good examples of forceful “women artists”, the focus of the second floor of the exhibition. As are Frida Kahlo and one of my favourite Mexican painters, Leonora Carrington, who share an important spot here. Extracts of Eisenstein ‘s film !Que viva Mexico ! are fascinating.

Diego Rivera Notre Dame de Paris, 1909

Diego Rivera Notre Dame de Paris, 1909

Ramón Cano Manilla, Indian from Oaxaca 1928 © Museo Nacional de Arte

Ramón Cano Manilla,
Indian from Oaxaca
1928 © Museo Nacional de Arte

I have to admit I walked out of the show slightly disappointed. Maybe it was just the Mariachis, guacamole and tequila that were missing…(Grand Palais until January 23)

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One Comment on “Viva Mexico, at Grand Palais”

  1. I came away with the same impression Laure. Part of the problem I think is that the great Rivera or Orozco murals can’t travel – we ourselves have to go to the Presidential Palace or Bellas Artes in Mexico City to appreciate them in all their glory and crushing scale! I did enjoy the clips of various Mexican movies mounted as a triptych and, especially, the excerpt from Eisenstein’s Que Viva Mexico – images of luminous beauty in black and white

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