Copyright, 1996 © Dale Carnegie & Associates, Inc.

Total War, Totalitarianism and the Arts

Chapter 34: Looking at Benton, Rivera, and

Lange

Humanities 103Instructor Beth Camp

Benton, Rivera and Lange

What do these three artists have in common? How would you describe the contribution of each?

Do these slides help you define “social realism” given your reading of Chapter 34?

Thomas Hart Benton

United States, 1889-1975best-known muralist and regionalist

painter of 1930s and early 1940sSharply criticized for his rural views. His

paintings were very popular, but critics called them vulgar

Noted for his dramatic American themes

What key elements do you see in the next works by Benton?

What mood is created by how Benton uses these elements: composition, content, black and white, and overall design in this lithograph? What is Benton trying to say?

Some say this painting foreshadows the coming storm of World War II. Do you agree or disagree?

Next: The Ballad of the Jealous Lover, 1934

In what way could the images, colors or composition in this painting be considered uniquely American?

Benton

Romance, 1931-1932

What does this painting suggest about rural American life?

Next: Trail Riders, 1964-1965

Thomas Hart Benton

Lithograph, Approaching Storm, 1938Paintings:

The Hailstorm, 1940 The Ballad of the Jealous Lover, 1934 Romance, 1931-1932 Trail Riders, 1964-1965

Do the images of these works reinforce uniquely American values?

Diego Rivera

Mexico, 1886-1957Inspired by native Mexican culture and

European studyPainted large murals dealing with Mexican

life, history and social problemsAlso painted murals in United States

celebrating socialism and industrial America

What are his key images, themes?

Diego RiveraNight of the Rich,

1928. Fresco, North wall, Courtyard of the Fiestas, Ministry of Education, Mexico City

Banner in Spanish: “All the hard/cruel money”What does this painting

tell you about class differences in Mexico at this time?

Rivera: A Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in Alameda Park, 1947-48, Alameda Hotel

Next: Detail of mural’s center

Rivera is shown here, holding hands with a a skeleton, a symbol of death, popularized during the Mexican Revolution by Posada, his teacher, to show the need for struggle.

Rivera painted personal memories with history in this mural, from despotic Mexican leaders, to Cortez, and the poor, who were once excluded from Alameda Park.

What reaction do you think Rivera was striving for? What do you think of the scale of this painting?

Rivera

Detail of right side, A Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in Alameda Park, 1947-48

What mood does Rivera create with his drawings of the common people?

Rivera

The Flower Carrier,1935

What’s the hidden message? What does Rivera want you to think about the working conditions shown?

Rivera

Flower Day, 1925

Dorothea Lange

United States, 1895-1965powerful documentary portraits of rural

America during the Great Depression of the 1930s and the Japanese Internment during World War II

What key themes can you find in her work?

Dorothea Lange

To live a visual life is an enormous undertaking, practically unattainable. But when the great photographs are produced, it will be down that road. But I have only touched it, just touched it. Migratory Cotton Picker, Eloy,

Arizona, 1940, FSA Collection, Library of Congress

Dorothea Lange

That's the first day I ever made a photograph actually on the street. I put it on the wall of my studio and customers, people whom I was making portraits of would come in and glance at them. And the only comment I ever got was, "What are you going to do with this kind of thing? I didn't know. But I knew that picture was on my wall, and I knew that it was worth doing."

White Angel Breadline, San Francisco, Ca. 1933, Oakland Museum Collection

Dorothea Lange

One should really use the camera as though tomorrow you'd be stricken blind.

Next: Photographs of the Japanese Internment

Dorothea Lange

The billboards that were up at the time I photographed. Savage, savage billboards. This is what we did. How did it happen? How could we?

Sources of Slides...

Mark Harden’s Artchive Museum of the City of San Francisco Library of Congress, “Women Come to the Front” Oakland Museum of California Virtual Diego Rivera Web Museum A Few Quotes from Dorothea Lange