When it comes to art and the public eye, you can’t avoid controversy. Society has grown more and more liberal as time goes on, but art continues to fuel revolution and inspire new generations. Of course, with that powerful visual motivation comes an inferno of differing opinions.

Enter the artwork of Diego Rivera. His pieces continue to spark ideas and controversial action, but how did this legendary mural artist begin his career? Rivera was born into a wealthy family, descended from Spanish nobility. When he was only three, his parents caught him drawing on the walls. Instead of punishing the youngster, they installed chalkboards and canvases, encouraging him to explore his creativity. An artist was born.

Instead of punishing the youngster, they installed chalkboards and canvases, encouraging him to explore his creativity.

Rivera first studied art as a child in Mexico City, and later was sponsored to travel to Europe, training his skills in Spain, and then Paris. Cubism just began gaining popularity in France, and Rivera quickly became enamored by the style. From 1913 to 1917 he embraced cubism, but inspired by Paul Cezanne’s work, he shifted his style to post-impressionism. Around this time, his paintings began attracting more attention, and some were displayed in several exhibitions.

In 1920 Rivera traveled to Italy, studying the Renaissance frescoes there before finally moving back to Mexico. Back in his home country, Jose Vasconcelos contracted him under a new government sponsored mural program to paint his first significant mural—Creation—inside the National Preparatory School. While creating this mural, Rivera reportedly had to defend himself—armed with a pistol—against right-wing students! If that’s not dedication to finish his first major piece, I don’t know what is.

Sometimes even attacking the church and clergy, his pieces even made him a controversial figure within communist circles.

In 1922 Rivera helped found the Revolutionary Union of Technical Workers, Painters and Sculptors, and later joined the Mexican Communist Party. Around this time, his style began to show itself in full, making use of large, simplified figures and bold colors in fresco only. The subject of his murals followed Mexican society and the 1910’s revolution, frequently telling stories while preaching Rivera’s radical political beliefs. Sometimes even attacking the church and clergy, his pieces even made him a controversial figure within communist circles.

After creating a large number of murals for the Mexican state—and later the Red Army Club of Russia—most notably a series of one hundred and twenty-four frescoes in the Secretariat of Public Education, the Mexican Communist Party expelled him from their ranks. Still, he never renounced his ideals, and they continued to be present in his later works. His complete decoration of the Secretariat went a long way towards the birth of the Mexican Muralist Movement—led in large part by Rivera himself.

Rivera established himself as one of the most sought after artists in the world

Following the popularity of this new movement, Rivera established himself as one of the most sought after artists in the world. In 1930, he traveled to San Francisco with his wife Frida Kahlo, carrying out various commissions in the states before creating what might be considered his most famous series, composed of twenty-seven frescoes entitled Detroit Industry within the Detroit Institute of Arts. While Rivera’s political messages within his murals continued to be evident, signs were posted defending the artistic merit of the pieces, even if the artist’s political ideals were “detestable”.

Only one of Rivera’s murals was ordered to be edited—Man at the Crossroads—upon the Rockefeller Center in New York City, as the mural featured a portrait of Vladimir Lenin. The artist refused to alter the image, and it was likely painted over later. Following the cancellation of another mural commission in light of this controversy, Rivera returned to Mexico, repainting Man at the Crossroads, which he now titled Man, Controller of the Universe, in the Palacio de Bella Artes in Mexico City. Years later, he returned once more to the US to carry out another series of ten panels for the Golden Gate International Exposition.

inspiring the new generation to take action as we might see in current events such as Occupy Wall Street.

So who was Diego Rivera? He was an artist who did not believe in censoring himself. In spite of the waves he caused through the unapologetic political messages beneath his murals, his bold aesthetics and bolder attitude tell us exactly who he was. From his founding role in the Mexican Muralist Revolution, to his fascination and outspokenness about common man’s place in the industrial age, Rivera’s powerful ideals sing true even today, inspiring the new generation to take action as we might see in current events such as Occupy Wall Street.

Whether or not such drastic political movements are necessary in the present age, the fact that Rivera’s potent visuals and underlying messages hold the power to inspire a generation—even over a half a century after the artist’s death—clearly tells us of the timelessness of his art form. MoMA (the Museum of Modern Art) is holding an exhibit of his works until May 2012, so if the striking history of this aesthetic revolutionary doesn’t convince you of anything, perhaps a first person experience might?