Rubén Martínez: Bringing "America Tropical" Back to Life
[Rubén Martínez is an English professor at Loyola Marymount University. He is finishing a book about the desert West and borderlands for Metropolitan Books.]
Seventy-eight years ago, on Oct. 8, 1932, David Alfaro Siqueiros — at the age of 36 already an important Mexican artist but not yet the icon he would become — sweated shirtless on a cool fall night as he "painted for dear life," The Times' art critic, Arthur Millier, wrote at the time.
He was on a deadline, and running late. The unveiling of the work "America Tropical" was just hours away, and the very center of the mural had yet to be filled in....
So far the elements of the mural included a Maya pyramid, the sinewy and winding branches of jungle trees, and an eagle hovering with open talons. On his final night of work Siqueiros added an indigenous man crucified on a double cross, with the eagle — now undeniably an overt reference to American imperialism — bearing down on him.
At the unveiling ceremony, which was attended by hundreds, the spectators gasped, according to Millier. Some because of the aesthetic power of the work, others at its political audacity, which doomed it. Within a few years, "America Tropical" was whitewashed and for decades largely forgotten.
What was hidden by ideology, paint and neglect is slowly reappearing. Last week a groundbreaking ceremony was held for the Siqueiros visitor center, which will provide a vantage point from which to see what remains of the mural, along with exhibits on the artwork and the artist's stay in Los Angeles.
The timing of "America Tropical's" reemergence in the midst of a nativist reaction means it can rejoin a debate it originally commented on. In 1931, just before Siqueiros' arrival, Depression-era anti-immigrant sentiment boiled over and the "repatriation" of hundreds of thousands of Mexican laborers (and in many cases U.S. citizens of Mexican descent) began locally with a raid at the Old Plaza....
Read entire article at LA Times
Seventy-eight years ago, on Oct. 8, 1932, David Alfaro Siqueiros — at the age of 36 already an important Mexican artist but not yet the icon he would become — sweated shirtless on a cool fall night as he "painted for dear life," The Times' art critic, Arthur Millier, wrote at the time.
He was on a deadline, and running late. The unveiling of the work "America Tropical" was just hours away, and the very center of the mural had yet to be filled in....
So far the elements of the mural included a Maya pyramid, the sinewy and winding branches of jungle trees, and an eagle hovering with open talons. On his final night of work Siqueiros added an indigenous man crucified on a double cross, with the eagle — now undeniably an overt reference to American imperialism — bearing down on him.
At the unveiling ceremony, which was attended by hundreds, the spectators gasped, according to Millier. Some because of the aesthetic power of the work, others at its political audacity, which doomed it. Within a few years, "America Tropical" was whitewashed and for decades largely forgotten.
What was hidden by ideology, paint and neglect is slowly reappearing. Last week a groundbreaking ceremony was held for the Siqueiros visitor center, which will provide a vantage point from which to see what remains of the mural, along with exhibits on the artwork and the artist's stay in Los Angeles.
The timing of "America Tropical's" reemergence in the midst of a nativist reaction means it can rejoin a debate it originally commented on. In 1931, just before Siqueiros' arrival, Depression-era anti-immigrant sentiment boiled over and the "repatriation" of hundreds of thousands of Mexican laborers (and in many cases U.S. citizens of Mexican descent) began locally with a raid at the Old Plaza....