Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera and More: Visiting Mexico City’s House Museums This Week
Friday, August 8, 2015 (6:00 am) to Monday, August 11, 2015 (7:00 pm)
In The Spotlight
In The Spotlight
Frayed Nails on Diego Rivera’s Walls
For the past 75-plus years, Diego Rivera’s house museum, the Casa Azul, has been the center of artistic activity. The house is home to the painter’s most famous mural, La Ballena, as well as a portrait of Rivera himself, and a few other pieces, along with much of the family’s private collection.
After Rivera died without leaving a will, the house became his foundation at the mercy of his children. The paintings, which hung side-by-side in his living rooms, were divided among the heirs.
In the house, the artist lived without air conditioning, no refrigeration, no modern appliances, not even a television. But he still managed to create a space that was warm and comfortable, as well as a gallery for the art he loved.
“The painter wanted things to look warm and beautiful. That is why so many of his paintings have nudes,” said Juan Carlos Barrios, a senior researcher at Museo de la Ciudad (the city’s municipal museum in charge of Rivera’s work), which will be participating in this week’s festival of the house’s collection, which explores the artist’s artistic life and his creative process.
Barrios noted that the painting La Ballena, which sits on the right side of Rivera’s living room, was the product of Rivera’s love for animals and in particular dogs.
“It’s an example of the artist’s vision of what was the most beautiful, which was the human face,” Barrios said.
The painting, which depicts Rivera as a wolf-