What Happened to the Radical Left in Art?

HuffPost
December 5, 2011

Diego Rivera: Murals for The Museum of Modern Art is on view at MoMA from November 13, 2011 to May 14, 2012. 

The exhibition unites key works made for Rivera's 1931 MoMA exhibition, which set new attendance records in its five-week run from December 22, 1931, to January 27, 1932. On view are Rivera's portable murals of frescoed plaster, slaked lime, and wood depicting scenes of the Mexican Revolution, the history of class inequity, and The Great Depression in New York City. The exhibition also includes full-scale drawings, smaller working drawings, archival materials related to the commission and production of these works, and designs for Rivera's ill-fated Rockefeller Center mural. 

MoMA is located at 11 West 53rd Street, New York 10019, (212) 708-9400. Visit the MoMA website. 


See enlarged views of the Diego Rivera murals with descriptions at MoMA's interactive website.  Commentators in the media and the blogosphere have remarked on how timely it is for the MoMA exhibition Diego Rivera: Murals for The Museum of Modern Art to coincide with the Arab Spring and the Occupy movements springing up around the globe. Some have suggested that Rivera would surely have joined in the occupations reacting to the fiscal malfeasance of Wall Street and the myriad corporations whose CEOs and trustees make up the 1% of humanity owning most of the world's wealth.

But should Rivera be considered a patron saint of the Occupation movements, as some have alluded? Not Quite.

Read more HERE.