Mexican artist Diego Rivera, whose biography is full of conflicting events and facts, is one of the most scandalous and prominent cultural figures in Mexico. His work, political views and personal life were in the spotlight throughout the first half of the twentieth century and are still being discussed.

Childhood and youth of the artist

This artist muralist, revolutionary and destroyer of women's hearts, was born on December 8, 1886 in the Mexican town of Guanajuato. He was to become the founder of the Mexican school of national painting and lead critics into a frenzy with a mixture of styles. The boy was not in excellent health, it was rumored that he barely survived as a child. Diego Rivera was a fan of telling tall tales, but it is known for certain that in 1893 his family moved to the country's capital, Mexico City. After 5 years, having successfully graduated from school, the young artist entered the San Carlos Academy of Arts. This institution gave the young man such an excellent education that upon completion he was able to receive a scholarship. Seizing the opportunity, he went on a trip to Spain. He then visited England, Belgium, Holland and Italy.

The personal life of the "cannibal"

For his passionate love for women and countless connections, Diego Rivera was nicknamed the "cannibal". He himself liked to portray himself as a fat frog clutching someone's heart in his paw. Natural fullness and heavy eyelids made the resemblance even outwardly noticeable. Describing the personal life of the rebel artist, they usually talk about his marriage to Frida Carlo. But she was not the first, and even more so the only woman in the life of the creator. The young Diego Rivera entered into his first marriage out of passionate love for the Russian artist Angelina Belova in 1911. They had a son. But the husband, possessed by endless passions and betrayals, left Angelina, going to Mexico. The second short marriage ended with Lupe Marin. The union was fruitful and gave the world two daughters.

wife and girlfriend

By 1929, when the second marriage had already broken up, he met the main woman of his life - Frida Carlo. Diego Rivera married a girl much younger than him. In 1939 there was a divorce, but already in 1940 they were married again. Throughout his life, Rivera remained macho and a passionate lover of women. He cheated on wives with mistresses who bore him illegitimate children.

The relationship between Diego and Frida was full of passion, love, jealousy and sometimes assault. Frida treated her husband's antics with great patience, idolized her idol, painted a lot of his portraits. But when he cheated on Frida with her sister, she could no longer forgive, and by 1939 the relationship broke up. Very soon, the husband, himself insultingly demanding a divorce, begged his wife to return to him on any terms. He provided her with financial support and gave in to her main demand. The condition for remarriage was the signing of a marriage contract providing for the complete renunciation of intimate relations between the spouses. In his personal life, the triangle of Diego Rivera, his wife and mistresses, remained.

This married couple did not have children, Frida's 2 pregnancies ended in miscarriages. In 1954, Rivera became a widower, and later there were suggestions that he helped his wife die, but these are nothing more than rumors. Until the last days, the spouses were united by communist ideas and communication with prominent Russian politicians.

Artist in politics

Since the beginning of the 30s, Diego Rivera has become the undisputed leader among Mexican muralists. He is certainly one of the most famous and controversial artists, whose political sympathies for communism, compelling monumental frescoes, exuberant creative activity and social life created the appearance of a genius. The founding father of a new direction in the art of the twentieth century increasingly attracted the attention of the world community.

The muralist's debut in America will take place in 1930 in the city of San Francisco, and already in December 1931, his personal exhibition will be held with amazing excitement. In the entire history of the museum, this was the second exposition of the same author. Henri Matisse was the first to receive such an honor. After the end of the exhibition, the artist goes to Detroit, where he was personally invited. Here, in the very center of the industrial thought of America, the artist Diego Rivera receives an order to make a fresco for the Art Institute on the theme "Detroit Industry". Henry Ford had a reputation as a staunch anti-Communist. Between 1929 and 1930, several thousand strikers were left unemployed at Ford's factories. It is curious that, despite this, Diego Rivera, who positioned himself as a fighter for the rights of the proletarian, accepts an order and payment from an industrial magnate.

Part of the fresco with the plot composition "Vaccination" seemed to be a reference to the iconography of the Nativity of Christ, which provoked a storm of indignation and protest in the press and church circles against the mural. A loud resonance in society became an integral part of the mural, and then brought Detroit loud fame.

Man at the crossroads

The political views of the artist were reflected in his work and sometimes caused violent conflicts with customers. The mural "Man at the crossroads, looking with hope to choose a new and better future" was the reason for one of these cases. Work on it began in March 1933. The debate happened already at the stage of choosing a palette, and as a result, the mural became colored at the insistence of the author. It consisted of three parts. In the center is a man - the master of the elements. As the work progressed, the fresco became more and more complex and, as a result, represented two worlds opposed to each other. On the one hand, the charms of socialism, and on the other, the horrors of capitalism. Among the characters even appears someone very similar to Lenin. The mural was to be presented to the public at the opening of the building on May 1, 1933. But the growing scandal prevented this from happening, and despite the fact that the Rockefeller family considered the option of keeping the mural outside the building, it was decided to destroy it. It was Rivera's biggest defeat in art and politics.

Influence on world art

“Diego gives me anxiety. He refused fame, preferring to do what he is doing now, ”Alfonso Reyes spoke of his close friend. The transition to cubism is significant for Diego Rivera. The paintings "Adoration of the Mother of God" and "Girl with Fruit" reflect the author's movement in this direction. A feature of recent works was a deformed understanding of space, although far from cubism. In all his works, the artist focused on the movement and richness of the landscape.

A significant influence on the formation of Diego Rivera had classical European styles in painting. It was the wall paintings of the period of the XIV - XVI centuries that gave a lot of food for thought and contributed to the success of Diego's frescoes. Starting in the 1940s, he achieved considerable success in fresco painting, thanks to which he was invited to work at the World Exhibition in San Francisco, and later attracted by the government to mural the National Palace in Mexico City.

Completion of the path

Diego Rivera died on November 24, 1957 in Mexico City and was buried in the Rotunda of famous creators. He was inconsistent in everything. He readily carried out the orders of the capitalists, glorifying socialism, adhering to communist views. He loved women, but destroyed their destinies and lives with the same passion with which he painted their portraits. Diego Rivera, whose style neither before nor after, could be repeated by any of the painters, left behind so many secrets and mysteries that several centuries would not be enough to unravel them.

Having passed away at the age of 70, he survived his beloved wife Frida a little and left an invaluable legacy in culture, history, politics and the hearts of those who loved him.

This is a story about a grandiose scandal due to the similarity of one of the characters in the great fresco with the face of Lenin. Even the portrait resemblance was enough for people not to see the fresco. Fear of this face and name makes the capitalists wake up in a cold sweat... And you are talking about a bomb planted under a building called Russia...

The famous Mexican muralist Diego Rivera was born on December 8, 1886. At the age of 3, Diego began to paint, but dissatisfied with the work in the albums, he moved to the walls. Instead of punishing him, his parents made a blackboard and gave him chalk. From the age of ten, he began to study painting, surprising teachers with a non-childish attitude to creativity and undoubted talent. He went to a good school, studied in Mexico City at the San Carlos Academy. Among his teachers was a wonderful master of landscape, one of the creators of national art, José Maria Velasco. The young artist continued his education in Europe. Until 1921, he lived mostly in Paris, but also in England, Italy, Spain, returned to war-torn Mexico and again left for France.

Portrait of Diego Rivera - Frida Kahlo

In Mexico in 1910, a revolutionary struggle began. The armed peasants came out against the dictatorship of the rich and the priests, the landowners who seized fertile land, and against the dominance of foreign capitalists. The war was unusually stubborn and cruel. The reactionary military clique was spiteful; American troops invaded Mexican territory twice. The bourgeoisie treacherously turned their weapons against the peasant detachments led by the popular leaders Francisco Villa and Emiliano Zapata. The rebels showed heroism and won remarkable victories. In February 1917, a constitution was adopted. Part of the landlords' land was transferred to the peasants.
Rivera returned to his homeland in 1921, and what is happening there captures him completely. The newly adopted progressive constitution, talented, enterprising people in leadership, exciting undertakings in the field of culture and public education inspire creative youth. Schools and libraries are opening in Mexico, enthusiasts go to distant villages to teach children, artists also strive to serve the enlightenment of the people. Art is created, understandable and close ordinary people, which carries the ideas of social liberation and the necessary knowledge, the walls of public buildings seemed to be its natural place. The interweaving of Renaissance and Mexican features has become a feature of monumental painting.


Triumph of the Revolution. 1926

In 1922, on the initiative of Siqueiros, an artistic association arose in Mexico, calling itself the "Revolutionary Syndicate (that is, the trade union) of workers in technology and art." In the same year, its leaders Rivera, Orozco and Siqueiros were invited, along with other artists, to paint the ancient building of the National Preparatory School in Mexico City.
In the main work of the twenties - the murals of the Ministry of Education in Mexico City - the artist resolutely switched to the fresco technique, powerful, generalized realistic images. In the first two years he painted the inner courtyard of the ministry, where a number of majestic labor scenes are displayed in open galleries.
The murals of the Ministry of Education were being completed when the Mexican reaction launched an offensive against the democratic gains of the revolution. President Calles, who came to power in 1924, set the task of destroying the frescoes created and preventing the emergence of new ones. Artists associated with the Communist Party and the Revolutionary Syndicate were persecuted. Some of the paintings were barbarously destroyed by a gang of reactionary youth, the syndicate was dissolved. A period of long-term struggle for the preservation of the traditions of revolutionary monumental painting began.

The Death of a Capitalist 1928. A fragment of a mural from the Ministry of Education in Mexico City.

In 1927-1928 Diego Rivera came to the USSR. Here he found like-minded people and allies, became one of the founders of the October association, where he collaborated with the artists Deineka, Moor, the architects the Vesnin brothers, and the film director Eisenstein. Contact with Soviet culture gave Rivera new creative impulses.
Returning to Mexico, he took up his largest work - the murals of the National Palace in Mexico City, begun in 1929 and completed in the 1950s. years. Frescoes representing the centuries-old history of Mexico were made. It is, as it were, a grandiose epic, a polyphonic oratorio in which the destinies of long-disappeared and living peoples are intertwined. Reality and fantasy, archaeological and ethnographic details, folk tales, people and deities are intertwined into a single whole.


Diego Rivera. Exploitation of Mexico by the Spanish conquistadors. Fragment of a fresco at the National Palace in Mexico City. 1929–1935

In the 1930s, Mexicans began to travel to the United States, exhibitions were organized, such masters as Jose Clemente Orozco, Diego Rivera, David Alfaro Siqueiros, received orders to create monumental murals in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Detroit, New York and others. cities. The representation of Mexican artists in America in those years became so wide that it was unofficially called the "Mexican Invasion".
At the personal invitation of Edsel Ford, son of Henry Ford, Diego Rivera goes to Detroit. In the industrial center of America, the artist receives an order for a mural in the central courtyard of the Institute of Arts on the theme “Industry of Detroit”, which Rivera undertakes to work on with pleasure and extreme interest: he studies the technology at local factories, the construction of modern conveyors, machine tools and gigantic engineering equipment. It is curious that Henry Ford by the early 1930s had a reputation as an uncompromising anti-communist. Between 1929 and 1930, thousands of workers were fired from the Ford plant. Rivera arrived in Detroit a week after another major row with the strikers. And despite this, the artist, who vividly declares his position as a fighter for the rights of the proletariat, accepts an order and money from an industrial magnate. The project in Detroit turned out to be difficult: a fragment of a mural with the subject of "Vaccination" caused allusions to the traditional iconography of the Nativity of Christ, which provoked a real storm of protest - in the press and in churches - against the mural. Despite all the attacks, on the first day about 10 thousand people came to see the finished fresco. A wide public response became part of the work itself and brought fame to the city. The events in Detroit can be considered a rehearsal for the general battle. Rivera had yet to endure the real battle to keep her job and her right to freedom of expression. The next major project of the artist in the United States was the design of the main lobby of the central building of the Rockefeller complex in New York.

Diego Rivera. "Vaccination". Fragment of the fresco "Industry of Detroit"

It was decided to entrust the creation of a monumental pictorial composition in the lobby of the main building of the complex - Radio Corporation of America (RCA, or 30 Rock) to Diego Rivera, although other candidates were also considered - Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso. In response to given topic"New Frontiers", the Mexican muralist proposed a complex multi-figure composition called "A Man at a Crossroads, Looking with Hope to Choose a New and Better Future". The fresco was supposed to consist of three parts: the central mural 5.85x12.5 m and two side mural - 5.10x3.25 m. According to the artist, the figure of a worker controlling the elements was the semantic and compositional center. As a result, the mural turned into a system of world order saturated with images, where the two poles - the capitalist and socialist worlds - are separated by ellipses filled with images representing macro- and micro-worlds. On the right side of the central mural special place occupies the revolutionary triad: the figures of a soldier, a peasant and a worker. Near image celebratory demonstration on Red Square, figures of athletes, an abundance of red flags. In contrast to the invigorating scenes demonstrating a flourishing socialist reality, on the left side of the central composition there is a different picture. The world of capitalism at the Rivera is full of disasters: wars, chemical weapons, depravity, disease, famine and unemployment. The side parts of a kind of triptych are devoted to the topics "Liquidation of superstitions in the field of science" and "Death of tyranny".


Diego Rivera. Sketch for a mural at the Rockefeller Center in New York. Around 1932. Paper, tempera, charcoal.

The grand opening of the building and the fresco was scheduled for May 1, 1933. Shortly before the completion of the mural, the site where the artist worked with his assistants is visited by New York World-Telegram reporter Joseph Lilly. On April 24, 1933, his article appeared with the defiant headline "Rivera Paints Communist Scenes, and John Rockefeller Jr. Pays the Bill." According to Rivera's assistants, in response to the publication, the artist transforms one of the central characters in order to strengthen the controversy - a worker from the revolutionary triad is endowed with the features of V.I. Lenin. The image of the leader of the Russian revolution in the center of the capitalist world and a symbol of its inviolability, in the RCA building, formally became the cause of a protracted conflict between the Rockefellers and Rivera. A few days after the newspaper hype, Nelson Rockefeller sent a letter to the creator of the controversial mural with a request to replace the image of Lenin with a generalized image of a labor leader. To which Rivera put forward a counter proposal - to leave Lenin and add the figure of Lincoln to the composition. This option did not suit the Rockefellers. Fearing accusations of promoting communism and public unrest, the managers of the Rockefeller Center did not find anything better than to remove Rivera from work, and close the unfinished mural from prying eyes with a protective screen. May 9, 1933 was the peak of the conflict, there was no access to the RCA building, the artist and assistants were taken out of the area. Lucien Bloch, one of Rivera's assistants, managed to take a photograph of the mural in the state in which it was left in May 1933: this is the only reproduction of the work from which today we can evaluate the composition, plot and content.


Diego Rivera. Painting in the lobby of the Rockefeller Center

Rockefeller ordered to pay Diego Rivera part of the fee in the amount of 14 thousand dollars (later the muralist will spend this money on creating the mural "Portrait of America" ​​at New Worker's School). An hour after the incident, a spontaneous demonstration gathered in support of the Mexican artist. Among the slogans were: "We want Rivera!", "Save Rivera's art!" The perpetrator of the dispute himself took Active participation in rallies, regularly appeared on the radio, the name of the artist for some time filled all the news editorials. The New York Times called the muralist "a fiery crusader of the brush". Along with the artist's supporters, ideological antagonists also express their position.
Amid public discussion in the press and on the streets of the city, Abby and Nelson Rockefeller considered keeping the Rivera mural outside the walls of the RCA Building. It was technically impossible to transfer the wall with the paint layer piece by piece for permanent storage in the MoMA collections. In February 1934, the fresco was destroyed. The news soon reached Mexico City, where the author of the work was at that moment. "Cultural vandalism" - this is how Rivera described the actions of the managers, comparing what is happening with the burning of books by the Nazis.


Diego Rivera. Fresco “The man who controls the universe. The man in the time machine. A man at a crossroads." Palace of Fine Arts. mexico city

Also in 1934, Diego Rivera signed a contract with the Mexican government to create a mural in the Palace of Fine Arts in Mexico City. Under new circumstances, the artist repeated the New York work with some changes (he added images of Marx, Engels, Trotsky, Lovestone, Wolfe and others to the composition).

Frescoes by Diego Rivera. “The Man Who Rules the Universe. The man in the time machine. A man at a crossroads." Palace of Fine Arts. mexico city

The outstanding Mexican artist Diego Rivera was famous not only for his brilliant talent as a muralist, political views, but also for his stormy love affairs, which are still legendary. Enveloping women with his extraordinary charm, Diego literally absorbed them with his violent passion. Many of his "victims" were talented social divas who achieved success with their talents, and had fairly well-known names.

Diego Rivera.

Diego Rivera himself was clumsy, huge and fat, with bulging eyes and swollen eyelids. There was no way he could be called handsome. But women have always idolized him. He conquered them with inner magnetism and wild passion, which simply seethed in him and destroyed women's hearts.

And Diego often portrayed himself as a fat-bellied frog with someone's heart in his hand. And he somehow admitted: "The more I love women, the more I want to make them suffer." That's why the temperamental Mexican was nicknamed "cannibal" by his Parisian friends, artists Picasso, Reyes, Modigliani, writer Ehrenburg.

Self-portrait.

In his own work, Diego bowed to beautiful women, comparing them with white feces - "slender, fragrant, breathing the freshness of a sunny morning." He skillfully splashed out his reverent attitude to this flower on his picturesque creations. With huge bouquets of snow-white feces, he emphasized the dark skin of temperamental Mexican women and the exquisite beauty of socialites. On his canvases, they seem to be buried in huge buds of lovely flowers.

Qala.

Angelina Belova - Rivera's first wife

The first marriage of the young Mexican Diego Rivera was made out of passionate love with the Russian artist Angelina Belova in 1911. "She gave me everything that a woman can give a man. In turn, she received from me all the suffering that a man can inflict on a woman." Their relationship was filled with passion, wild jealousy, despair and even fights. They had a son who died of influenza in 1918. As a result, the couple broke up, but Angelina continued to love Diego all her life.

Angelina Belova.

While living in Paris, she dreamed of going to Mexico. Rivera had such a strong influence on her. She often wrote in letters ex-husband that now Diego is her god, Mexico is her homeland, and Spanish is her native language. And at the age of 45, Angelina nevertheless moved to Mexico, and lived there until the end of her days. And one day, when they met by chance in Mexico City, Diego pretended not to recognize her...

Maria Vorobieva-Stebelskaya, nicknamed "Marevna"

Maria Vorobyova-Stebelskaya (Marevna). Self-portrait. (1929)

While still married to Angelina, the hot Mexican charmed another Russian artist, nicknamed Marevna, which Maxim Gorky invented for the 19-year-old beauty when they met in Capri in honor of the fabulous sea princess. “No one will ever have such a name, be proud and justify it. But you should not go to Paris, you will burn there, ”the young writer said then to the young artist.

But Paris at that time was mysterious, full of legends and amazing stories that were created by contemporaries. And all this could not but captivate the young girl. She plunged headlong into the bohemian life of the French capital.

Having fallen in love with the young Marevna, Rivera literally struck down his “victim” with pressure and passion. And when the artist realized that there were no moral prohibitions for the mad Diego, she gave up. And in her memoirs she later wrote: "I felt a strange craving for this unusual person, in whom the strength of a genius and the weakness of a child were combined."

Marika Rivera is Diego's daughter.

And a year after the death of his son Diego, Marevna had a daughter named Marika, who later became a famous film actress and dancer. But the father in public never recognized the girl as a daughter. The reason for this was furious jealousy: Picasso liked to tease a friend, and stroking Mary's rounded belly, he said: "This is not yours - this is mine." What strongly pissed off the Mexican.

Soon Diego leaves his mistress with a child and leaves for his homeland, where he decides to start new life. As a memory of Marevna, he leaves a "fantastic bouquet of passions", in which there was everything: extravagant love, insults, wild jealousy. She gave him a scar on his neck from a knife.

“He was never constant in his actions, drawn by lust and passion for women,” Marevna would write later, “even he left the Communist Party twice, returning there with letters of repentance.”

Guadalupe Marin - Rivera's second wife

Guadalupe Marine. (1938).

Returning to Mexico, Rivera, inspired by the changes that had taken place in the country after the revolution, joins the Mexican Communist Party. And he begins work on his monumental works, which later became known as murals.

And in 1922, he officially married a second time to Guadalupe Marin, a famous model and writer. Diego was inflamed with passionate love for the tall, beautiful Mexican Lupe, who soon became the mother of his two daughters. But in 1928 this marriage also broke up. Guadalupe could not come to terms with this for a long time, and for many years she reminded Diego and his next wife of herself.

Diego and Frida Kahlo: the marriage of an elephant and a dove


Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera.

By 1929, 43-year-old Diego met the main woman of his life - 22-year-old Mexican artist Frida Carlo. With none of his beloved women, Rivera was not as close spiritually as with her.

Frida Kahlo. Self-portrait.

His dove was not like “any of the women he had known so far. Not like Angelina with her pale, illumined face of a Slav woman, not like the impulsive Marevna, not like the sensual, unbridled Lupe Marin. This is a girl from a cosmic race Vasconcelos, and in some ways she is similar to Diego himself: she whimsically combines the carefree gaiety of the Indians and the sadness of the mestizos, and the Jewish restlessness and sensuality that she inherited from her father are mixed in everything. All these virtues of young Frida attracted Diego to her like a magnet.

Portrait of Christina. (1928).

In 1939, a divorce occurred due to Diego's intimate relationship with Frida's sister, Christina. After her husband's betrayal, she decided that she also had the right to love interests. And one of these hobbies was Leon Trotsky, who settled in Mexico with his wife in 1937.

But already in 1940, Diego and Frida were married again. Diego himself begged his wife to return home, agreeing to any conditions. And she put forward a demand to conclude a marriage contract, which provided for a complete rejection of intimate relationships between spouses.

Diego and Frida

This married couple had no children, Frida's two pregnancies ended in miscarriages. Together with Diego, they lived for twenty-five years.

Diego Rivera and Maria Felix - the legend of Mexico

Maria Felix.

Maria Felix - the famous actress of Mexico was called the "devourer of men's hearts." Men, being next to her, lost their heads. Diego Rivera was passionately in love with the actress, and painted many of her portraits. It was said that they were lovers. And Frida herself asked Maria to marry Diego after her death.

Maria Felix.

Maria Felix.

Emma Hurtado - Rivera's last wife

Diego Rivera and Emma Hurtado. | Photo: mirfaces.com.

After the death of Frida, Diego soon remarried. His chosen one was the mistress of the art salon Emma Hurtado.
Throughout his life, Rivera remained an indefatigable macho and womanizer, cheating on all his wives with mistresses who bore him illegitimate children.
Diego died at the age of 70, only three years outliving his dove, Frida. After himself, the famous Mexican left a huge legacy in art, culture and politics. He was not only a passionate lover of women, but also a "fiery crusader of the brush."

Diego Rivera, known by the nickname "cannibal", was born into a well-to-do family in Guanajuato, Mexico (Guanajuato, Mexico), on December 8, 1886. Diego's twin brother, Carlos, lived only two years. From 1896 to 1902, Rivera studied at the Academy of Fine Arts of San Carlos, and then went to Spain.

In 1922, Rivera joined the Mexican Communist Party, from which he left in 1929. He began to adhere to Trotskyist views, but due to a conflict with Trotsky himself (Leon Trotsky), Diego was expelled from the Mexican section of the Trotskyist "4th International".

The artist recreated his famous mural "Man at the Crossroads", destroyed in 1934 by decision of the board of the Rockefeller Center. In a slightly modified version, called "The Man in Control of the Universe", Trotsky appeared, alongside Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.

Possessing a special charm and attractiveness, Diego broke one woman's heart after another. Repeatedly depicting himself as a fat-bellied frog holding someone's heart in his hand, the artist once admitted that he was eager to subject women to suffering, especially those with whom he was madly in love.

The first wife of the "cannibal" was the Russian artist Angelina Belova (Angelina Beloff). The marriage was concluded in 1911, and the wife gave her husband "everything that only a woman can give a man." For this, Diego "rewarded" her "with all the suffering that a man can inflict on a woman."

Passion, intrigue, insane jealousy, despair and even assault - these were the main components of the marriage between Belova and Rivera. Their son failed to recover from the flu and died in 1918. The couple broke up in 1921, but the Russian artist was never able to burn out the love from her heart for "a man with swollen eyelids and bulging eyes."

In one of the letters to her ex-husband, Angelina did not fail to inform that Diego became God for her. This "god" somehow accidentally met her in Mexico City (Mexico City) and pretended not to recognize her or never knew her at all.

While still in his first marriage, Rivera made hostage to his love another Russian artist, Maria "Marevna" Vorobyeva-Stebelskaya (Maria Vorobieff-Stebelska). The heartbreaker pressed on his new "victim" until Maria realized that any moral principles were alien to this man. Later, in her memoirs, she stated that she was attracted by the unusualness of Diego, who has the strength of a genius and the weakness of a child.

Best of the day

Marevna's illegitimate daughter, Marika Rivera, who became a theater and film actress and dancer, known for the films "Fiddler on the Roof" and "The Girl on a Motorcycle" ), Diego never admitted in public. He left his daughter and a wildly offended and humiliated mistress, who left him a scar on his neck from a knife, and went to his native land in order to start all over again. Marevna later wrote that River's guide to life was his lust and passion for women.

Returning to Mexico (Mexico) and inspired by the prevailing atmosphere in the country after the revolution, the artist began to create his monumental works, called murals. In 1922, he married the Mexican model and writer Guadalupe Marín. She bore her husband two daughters.

In 1927, the artist visited the USSR (USSR), where the following year he was appointed a founding member of the Oktyabr association. Diego took part in the celebration of the 10th anniversary of the Great October socialist revolution in the Russian capital. His sketches of participants in the celebration in Moscow (Moscow) were shown in an exhibition at the New York Museum contemporary art. The artist visited the USSR for the second time in 1955-1956.

Without cheating on himself, Rivera cheated on his second wife with student Frida Kahlo, who became the main woman in his life. The marriage broke up in 1929, and in the same year, 42-year-old Diego married a 22-year-old "girl from a space race", attracting him like a magnet. However, this connection was more spiritual than carnal, and the artist did not experience anything like this in his life.

In 1939, Frida filed for divorce after learning about her husband's infidelity with her sister Christina. Kahlo decided that she also had the right to sleep with whomever she wanted, and Trotsky, who settled in Mexico with his wife in 1937, remained one of her lovers.

However, in 1940, Diego and Frida tied the knot again. The husband, exhausted by separation, was ready to do anything to return the "extroversive nature", and she demanded that a marriage contract be concluded, which provided for a complete renunciation of sex. The couple had no children. Suffering from polio and undergoing a terrible car accident, in poor health, Kahlo suffered two miscarriages.

The artist died on July 13, 1954. They say that she herself begged the Mexican actress Maria Felix (María Félix), many of whose portraits were painted by Diego, to marry Rivera after her death. The wedding really took place, but with Emma Hurtado (Emma Hurtado), the owner of the art salon.

Being an atheist, Diego became a member of the theological and secret mystical "Order of the Rose and Cross", founded by the American occultist Harvey Spencer Lewis.

When in 1954 Rivera tried to return to the Mexican Communist Party, which considered the "Order of the Rose and Cross" "suspiciously similar to Freemasonry", the artist was called to account. Initially, Diego claimed to have infiltrated the Order, a typical Yankee organization, for the glory of communism.

However, later he assured that, in essence, the order had a materialistic nature, allowed the existence of various states of matter and energy, and was based on ancient Egyptian occult knowledge from Amenhotep IV (Amenhotep IV) and Nefertiti (Nefertiti).

Diego Rivera (Spanish: Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez; December 8, 1886 - November 25, 1957) was a Mexican painter, muralist and graphic artist.

Biography of Diego Rivera

Diego Rivera was born on December 8, 1886 in the city of Guanajuato in northwestern Mexico into a wealthy family. On his paternal side, he came from the Spanish nobility. Diego had a twin brother who died at the age of two. His mother was a Converso, a Jewish woman whose ancestors had been forcibly converted to Catholicism.

Speaking about himself, Rivera wrote in 1935: "My Jewishness is the main part of my life."

From 1896 to 1902 he took drawing and painting lessons at the San Carlos Academy of Fine Arts in Mexico City. For his success he was awarded a scholarship, which allowed the artist to go to Spain.

From 1907 to 1921 Rivera lived in Europe. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Madrid (1907), then lived and worked in Paris (1909-1920), in Italy (1920-1921). He also traveled to Belgium, the Netherlands and the UK.

He was closely acquainted with the Parisian artistic elite, including Pablo Picasso, Alfonso Reyes and others.

Creativity Rivera

In 1921, Rivera returned to Mexico and soon became involved in the implementation of the state art program to decorate public buildings with frescoes.

Since 1922, he became one of the founders of the Mexican school of monumental painting, having painted a huge number of walls of public buildings.

One of the main themes in Rivera's work was folklore stories, beliefs and customs of the people of Mexico, as well as the revolutionary movement in Mexico.

Portrait of Madesta and Inesita The Land's Bounty Rightfully Possessed Motherhood Angelina and the Child Diego

During the 1920s, he developed his own style of monumental painting.

In the 1930s he became one of the most famous artists in Mexico.

From 1930 to 1934 Rivera lived in the USA, working on murals for buildings in New York, Detroit and San Francisco.

In 1931, a large exhibition of his works was held at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.

In 1932-1933, Rivera made a mural "Man at the Crossroads" for the Rockefeller Center in New York. The most significant in this fresco were the images of V. I. Lenin joining the hands of the workers, and the demonstrations of workers on Red Square in Moscow.

The fresco was destroyed in 1934 (an official statement from the Center) after Rivera refused to replace the image of Lenin with "an image of the face of an unknown person," as was written in a letter from the Center's lawyer. No money was paid to Rivera for the creation of this fresco.

For several years after 1934 he was mainly engaged in easel painting. Working in oils and watercolors, he preferred such genres as portrait and landscape.

Beginning in 1940, Rivera again turned to fresco painting: he worked for the World Exhibition in San Francisco, painted the National Palace in Mexico City. The compositions Man at the Crossroads (1933) for the Rockefeller Center in New York and Sunday at the Alameda (1948) for the Prado Hotel in Mexico City caused political and religious controversy.

How the Rivera artist was influenced by both classical European visual arts(he studied wall paintings of the XIV-XVI centuries), and modernism, in particular cubism. Traditional Mexican artistic genres and styles were also very close to him.

On December 8, 1886, the famous Mexican muralist Diego Rivera, nicknamed "The Cannibal", was born.

During his lifetime, crowned with all sorts of laurels, he traveled to many countries, and everywhere - both in Europe, and in America, and at home - enjoyed tremendous success, not only among customers and lovers of his grandiose painting, but also among the fair sex.

He had countless wives and mistresses, and he did not even try.

By the way, there were some very outstanding women among them: suffice it to name the original, famous Mexican artist and the not so famous, but also gifted artist Maria Vorobyeva-Stebelskaya - his crazy Russian love, nicknamed Marevna, in honor of the fabulous sea princess.

For some time, Diego lived in Paris with the engraver Angelina Belova - it was she who gave birth to his son, who soon died. Needless to say, fatal passions burned with a blue flame: jealousy, despair, fights ... Sometimes it came to stabbing.

That's just why - "Cannibal"? This strange nickname originated in the bohemian Paris of the beginning of the century, where impoverished artists from different parts tried to achieve fame and money.

Diego, who arrived there, was friends with Pablo Picasso and Modigliani and was, in general, not the worst friend - he argued about art, created new forms, drank and went crazy, wandered around taverns like the rest.

And yet: "Cannibal". How can this be explained?

The answer is simple: Diego Rivera devoured beautiful and gifted women.

It is said that when Diego Rivera was born, the midwife considered that he was "not a tenant" and put the baby in a dunghill. But his grandmother warmed his body with fresh pigeon giblets.

The artist was very fond of shocking the public with non-existent facts of his childhood and youth - allegedly his family was expelled for political reasons, and from the age of six he himself was an ardent anti-clerical. In fact, he went to a regular Catholic school, and his family was looking for a new place of residence due to the fact that the person who supported her with money died.

In his work, Diego Rivera liked to imitate artists whose styles were considered completely incompatible. This extremely annoyed the critics.