© Georg Rauch

Georg Rauch: A Clear View All The Way To The Horizon

Some years ago, during a lovely spring afternoon at his Mexican home overlooking Lake Chapala, artist Georg Rauch needed something to take to a monthly gathering of artists and writers in Ajijic. While fighting for the Third Reich on the Eastern Front, he had written letters to his mother – in all some eighty-four letters […]

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Original art by Fiona Dunnett who makes her home in Oaxaca. © Fiona Dunnett, Alvin Starkman, 2009

Fiona Dunnett: images of self and death in Oaxaca

Comic strips, a young Canadian’s self portraits, and photographs of violent deaths in a Mexican daily newspaper, make strange bedfellows. But they constitute a major part of the driving force for the creative energies of artist Fiona Dunnett, a resident of Oaxaca, Mexico. Ottawa-born Dunnett has been living in Oaxaca since 2005. As in the […]

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Jacobo Angeles talks about his work, which is present in the Smithsonian Institute and Chicago's National Museum of Mexican Art. © Alvin Starkman 2008

Jacobo Angeles: A rich wood-carving tradition in Oaxaca, dating to pre-Hispanic times

Jacobo Ángeles’ work is prominently displayed in The Smithsonian, Chicago’s National Museum of Mexican Art, and elsewhere throughout the continent and further abroad, in museums, art colleges and galleries One would be hard-pressed to search the Americas and find creators of folk art with more form, symbolism and importance to the development and sustenance of […]

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This oil and acrylic on canvas by Manuel Reyes depicts clay effigies eating watermelon. The color scheme is that of the Mexican flag. © Alvin Starkman 2008

Manuel Reyes: sculptor, painter and renaissance man from Oaxaca’s Mixteca Alta

“Look at that female warrior over there… notice the belt I made for her, with penises hanging from it, her trophies.” Artist Manuel Reyes aspires to exhibit his work in art galleries in Oaxaca and Mexico City. Give him that exposure over the next couple of years, and there’s little doubt his genius will be […]

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Puente (bridge) de Xico In the area around Jalapa, Veracruz, 1920 Photography by Hugo Brehme

Out of Mexico’s past: Photographs that speak volumes (Hugo Brehme and others)

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 Rodriguez would like to know. The young photography historian, resident research expert of the INAH (National Institute of Anthropology and History) Fototeca – the national […]

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Ancient pottery on tasteful display. © Anthony Wright, 2009

Anahuacalli: Diego Rivera’s gift of indigenous treasures

Legendary Mexican artist and master muralist Diego Rivera spent so much time avidly collecting pre-Hispanic art it’s a wonder he ever got around to painting. Rivera amassed a collection of thousands of objects: pottery items, stone and jade figures of animals, gods and humans. Many of the purchases were made on the black market. On […]

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Andy Warhol art in Mexico City: The Bazaar Years (1951-1964)

Andy Warhol art in Mexico City: The Bazaar Years (1951-1964)

Mexico City is a center of art and culture, a required stop for world class traveling exhibits and concerts. Pop Art makes its presence known in Mexico City’s Museo de Arte de la SHCP. Pop Art is said to be the first movement to straddle two aesthetically opposed dimensions, arriving at a fresh place where […]

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The original photo of the second ceiling mural by artist Ettore Serbaroli in Chihuahua. It shows cherubs similar to those sketched in Josefina's autograph book. © Joseph A. Serbaroli, Jr., 2014

On the trail of lost art works in Chihuahua

Where are people and stories brought together from far-flung places around the globe? One place is MexConnect.com. Several years ago my story about a quest for art treasures in Chihuahua was published here. I traveled there from New York with my daughter Elise to find artworks that were painted by my grandfather, the artist Ettore Serbaroli (1881 […]

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Frida Kahlo 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

The photography of Manual Alvarez Bravo (1902 – 2002)

Manual Alvarez Bravo was one of the truly great photographers of the twentieth century. His work sprang from a vision born of his time and his culture, but it touched people from every society all over the world. Diego Rivera called his work a profound and discrete poetry. He said it was like those particles […]

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