Diego Rivera Quotes on Art

Diego Rivera was a famous Mexican painter and husband of Frida Kahlo. He is best known for his large wall murals, often with social and political messages in them. Much controversy surrounded his “Man at the Crossroads” mural painted in the Rockefeller Center, which was commissioned by Nelson Rockefeller. The artist added symbols of communism, which included a portrait of Leon Trotsky and Vladimir Lenin. Famous Diego Rivera paintings and murals include “Man at the Crossroads”, “The History of Mexico”, “Motherhood, Angelina and the Child Diego”, “The Mathematician”, “Still Life with Tulips”, “Portrait of Ramón Gómez de la Serna”, “Adoration of the Virgin and Child”, “Knife and Fruit in Front of the Window”, “Portrait of Adolfo Best Maugard” and “Detroit Industry Murals”.

Mini biography: Born Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez on the 8th of December, 1886 in Guanajuato City, Mexico. His mother was María del Pilar Barrientos and his father Diego Rivera Acosta. Rivera married the Russian artist Angelina Beloff in 1911 and they divorced in 1921. He married his second wife Guadalupe Marín in 1922 and they divorced in 1928. His third wife was the famous Mexican artist Frida Kahlo who he married in 1929, divorced in 1939, remarried in 1940, and Frida died in 1954. He then married his fourth wife in 1955. The artist died on the 24th of November, 1957 in Mexico City, Mexico at the age of 70.

List of Famous Diego Rivera Art Quotes

Every good composition is above all a work of abstraction. All good painters know this. But the painter cannot dispense with subjects altogether without his work suffering impoverishment. Diego Rivera

Never before had a woman put such agonizing poetry on canvas as Frida did. Diego Rivera

The day that Mexico’s Cathedral is turned into a useful building, no longer the provider of opium to the people, and is turned into a discussion center, a popular museum, a garrison, a library, or grain cellar, I would love nothing more than to decorate it. Diego Rivera

I’ve never believed in God, but I believe in Picasso. Diego Rivera

This bourgeois mind of Mexico is that of a special virulence, for being mixed in race for only a few generations, it is also lamentably mixed in its ‘culture.’ It is, in a word, saturated with European bad taste, the finer European influences having been almost wholly rejected by the Creole of Mexico. Diego Rivera

When we began, we had no opportunities; we prepared in silence and created our own opportunity. Diego Rivera

My Jewishness is the dominant element in my life. Diego Rivera

Through her paintings, she breaks all the taboos of the woman’s body and of female sexuality. Diego Rivera

Your engineers are your great artists and these highways are the most beautiful things I have seen in your beautiful country. Out of them and the machine will issue the style of tomorrow. Diego Rivera

If I ever loved a woman, the more I loved her, the more I wanted to hurt her. Frida was only the most obvious victim of this disgusting trait. Diego Rivera

Diego Rivera Self Portrait Drawing

More on Mexican Artist Diego Rivera

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Related or similar popular artists and celebrities include: Pablo Picasso, Georgia O’Keeffe, Frida Kahlo and other Famous Mexican Artists.