Alfredo Zalce--Michoacán's living legend
Alfredo Zalce, at age 94, is the elder of Mexico's last living renowned, great revolutionary muralists.
He was born in Patzcuaro, in the state of Michoacan, on January 12, 1908. During his early year...
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Embryography of a jeweler Raúl Ybarra
It is perhaps only in the "advanced" civilizations that artists are elevated above craftsmen, with the former thought to be leading the cultural vanguard while the latter are only practicing traditiona...
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Out of the past, speaking volumes
Anyone out there on the information highway heard of an American photographer named North? Worked in Mexico, made dozens of daguerreotypes of the cities, churches and countryside circa mid-1800s? Gina ...
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Alejandro Rangel Hidalgo - Universal artist from Colima
In the half-light I enter the ‘horno’ or oven room. A base of reds frames the pre-Hispanic pieces in the Museum of Alejandro Rangel Hidalgo. It is easy to imagine the fiery origin of the land ...
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Famous Mexicans on their stamps - Frida Kahlo
Frida Kahlo was a talented artist considered by many to be a modern master. She also was a tough lady, fighting physical adversity from early childhood. Her artwork provides a look into her tormented b...
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Edward James, Builder Of Dreams
"Look, we move among a bunch of 'pseudo-realists',
who.... produce nothing but junk.
So, they try to act like madmen to justify themselves.
On the other hand, you who are real
lab...
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Accidental Paintings: Photographs by Carol Stein
Here's a most unusual collection of photographs and Mexico Connect is delighted to bring them to you. They are all, despite the title, photos taken in San Miguel de Allende where photographer Carol Stein visited last year. All of them exhibit odd and striking views of the town as well as the unusual abstract approach that Ms. Stein brings to her work.
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Frida: A Novel Based on the Life of Frida Kahlo by Barbara Mujica
"Although events in Mexican history and in Frida's life provide the general framework, many incidents and characters portrayed here are the author's inventions. Although many of Frida's biographers mention her younger sister, Christina, I have reinvented the youngest Kahlo girl to make her a perspicacious witness to Frida's life. My intention in writing Frida was to capture the essence of Frida Kahlo's personality, not to document her life. I was particularly interested in what it might be like to be the unexceptional sister of such an exceptional woman…."
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Mexican Folk Art from Oaxacan Artist Families by Arden Aibel Rothstein and Anya Leah Rothstein
There are hundreds of photos of all kinds of artistic output, from pottery to wood carvings, from basket weaving to candle making, and lots more but we're given a much closer look at the actual creators of all this work. We're treated to wonderful works featuring mermaids, clowns, devils, angels, fishes, skeletons, Biblical scenes, animals and birds of all kinds, and even ladies of the night. These are all used to decorate masks, bedspreads, candles, baskets, jewelry, furniture, statues, toys, pottery and clothing and much, much more plus some 87 brief biographies of each of the artists.
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Casa Santiago: Zapotec rug weavers of Teotitlan del Valle, Oaxaca
Porfirio Santiago weaving a Zapotec rug in Oaxaca, Mexico Copyright 2007-03-01
Porfirio Santiago is at his loom, diligently weaving a massive 2 x 3 meter rug with traditional designs, f...
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Michoacán's master craftspeople and their arts
Abdon Punzo Angel's thick hands tapped minute details into the menacing snout of the copper dragon that sat immobilized in a vise, its body seeming to squirm. Beside him, another shiny dragon writhed f...
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Creations In Silver - By Dona Eva Martinez
The designs of Doña Eva Martinez are mostly 18th and 19th century with some pre-hispanic symbolism, predominantly earrings. They are of pure silver and treated to give an antique finish. The designs a...
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A Legend In His Time - Composer Agustín Lara
Music is the universal language that crosses all barriers and penetrates the heart. There was no composer who understood the emotional draw of music better than Agustín Lara, and no song writer who ha...
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Mexican muralists: the big three - Orozco, Rivera, Siqueiros.
Mexico in 1910 was a country in despair. Foreign domination had been replaced by the tyranny of President Porfirio Diaz. Two-thirds of the people lived in abject poverty and slavery was growing at a fa...
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Francisco Goitia - A Product Of His Times
When we talk of Mexico's great painters, Francisco Goitia isn't the first name that comes to mind. Yet, without a doubt, he is one of last century's great painters. He the spirit of his times and refle...
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The photography of Manual Alvarez Bravo (1902 - 2002)
Manuel Alvarez Bravo is not as well known for his portraits of artists and intellectuals, but many are dazzling. One of his finest portraits is that of Frida Kahlo, dressed in necklaces and flowing clothes, leaning against a table with a curious glass ball. He probably met Kahlo through her father, Wilhelm Kahlo, to whom he was introduced by Hugo Brehme, his teacher at the start of his career. He and Frida were to become friends.
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Maria Izquierdo - Monumento Artistico De La Nación
On October 25, 2002, one hundred years after her birth , the Mexican painter Maria Izquierdo was declared a Monumento Artistico de la Nación by Mexico City's National Commission for Arts and Culture. ...
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Rufino Tamayo
I've just recently seen the " Tamayo Illustrador" exhibition at the Museo del Periodismo y las Artes Graficas in downtown Guadalajara. Rufino Tamayo is a Mexican icon, and this was one show I did...
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Francisco Toledo
It would be a terrible oversight to write an "Arts in Mexico" column without paying special tribute to Francisco Toledo, one of Mexico's greatest living artists. In the eyes of many, he is Mexico's gre...
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From A Mexican Perspective - The Vision of Adolfo Best Maugard
During the heady days that followed the Mexican revolution, the air was filled with fervent nationalism. The euphoria of new beginnings brought out the best in creative vision from talent that fed on t...
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Jose Clemente Orozco and Diego Rivera - The Murals
The art and attitudes of the two great Mexican muralists, Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco could not be more different. Rivera was a classicist, Orozco an expressionist. Rivera was optimistic, Or...
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The legacy of Agustin Victor Casasola (Photographer 1874 - 1938)
Agustín Victor Casasola was not a painter or a poet or one of the many intellectuals or revolutionaries during the early decades of the twentieth century who consciously strove to forge a Mexican identity. Yet, as witness and recorder of those tumultuous years, his influence was as great and may prove to be more lasting.
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Saturnino Herran: A Bright Light Too Soon Extinguished
At least ten years before the "Big Three" - Rivera, Orozco, Siqueiros - came into their own as world-renown muralists, a lone painter was setting the groundwork. His name was Saturnino Herran. He was t...
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Mexican lithographer Jose Guadalupe Posada: Past and present
In one month, on November 2, it will be "El Dia de los Muertos" (the Day of the Dead), and Jose Guadalupe Posada, or Don Lupe as he was known to his friends, a poor but prolific printm...
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