Download
1 / 10
E N D
By: Juan R. My Museum
Our featured painting by Diego Rivera is The Flower Carrier. Notice the bold, bright colors he uses. With the use of shadows he makes the subject stand out from the background of the painting almost as if the figures are outlined. How does he repeat the colors? Compare the size of the man to the size of the woman. The man is carrying the heavy load, but he appears to be a smaller person than the woman putting the load on his back. Diego Rivera ( de A go rih VEH rə) was born in Guanajuato, Mexico in 1886. He had a twin brother, but his brother died when he was only a year and a half old. His mother became depressed and sent little Diego to live with his nurse Antonia, an Indian woman. She cared for him in a small village high up on the mountain. When he was six years old Diego's family moved to Mexico City. Diego loved to draw and his father made a studio for him by covering the walls with black canvas on which he could draw with chalk. He loved drawing soldiers, but he was not destined to be a soldier. He was sent to military school at age 10, but only stayed for a short time. He enrolled in evening art classes at the San Carlos Academy of Fine Arts in Mexico City. He studied there for five years , but was later expelled for participating in student revolts at the school. These experiences were only the beginning of the controversy which would surround Rivera throughout his life. At age 16 he left and started his career as a painter. The wall in front of Diego Rivera's home in Acapulco, Mexico is decorated with mosaics in bright colors. Diego Rivera
Leonardo Da Vinci Leonardo Da Vinci (lay oh NAHR doe dah VEEN chee) was born in a small village called Vinci in the country of Italy. He was raised by his grandparents and even as a boy showed signs of genius. He could work hard mathematics problems and was a very good artist. His father Piero recognized that he had artistic talent and sent him to Florence to study with the artist Verrocchio (və RAWK ih oh). In addition to art he also learned sculpture and engineering. Soon he was a better artist than his teacher. At age 20 he was accepted into the painters' guild in Florence.
Ito Jakuchu was born in Kyoto in Japan. His father was a rich groceryman. The grocery shop had been in his family for four generations, and the family lived at the shop. He was 23 years old when his father died, and he inherited the business. He didn't really want to be a businessman, so after a few years,he let his younger brother run the shop, and he spent the rest of his life painting.Jakuchu enjoyed painting pictures of birds, and in his garden he kept all kinds of birds that he could use as subjects in his paintings.In order to learn how to paint, he copied Chinese paintings, perhaps thousands of them. Then he got tired of just copying the paintings of other artists and decided to paint what he saw. He would watch the birds and other fowl in his garden and then paint those animals.When he painted The Tiger, he could not paint from a live model because there were no tigers in Japan, so he copied a picture that a Chinese artist had painted.You will enjoy looking at the paintings of Roosters and Hens . The roosters shown are the Yokohama variety. These roosters had tails that could grow to be 26 feet long! Jakuchu lived to be 85 years old and never married. He did not enjoy fame for his painting during his lifetime. People only began to become interested in his works after he had been gone for a hundred years or more.In the year 2000, which was 200 years after his death, the Kyoto National Museum featured a showing of his artworks. Ito Jakuchu
