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Torso-Sheaf (Torse-Gerbe)
sculpture
marble
1931
Jean (Hans) Arp
France

#arp #jeanarp #hansarp #france #frenchart #marblesculpture #dated1931 #sculpture #art #modernart #surrealism #surrealistart #abstractart #abstractsculpture #biomorphicsculpture #biomorphism #centrepompidou #paris
This is the sculpture Torso-Sheaf (Torse Gerbe) by Jean Arp. The sculpture is a well-known example of Arp's sensuous, biomorphic (life-like) forms, which he began creating in the 1930s. It fuses human and vegetal elements, representing a subtly flowing body in a dance-like, twisting movement. Arp was a co-founder of the Dada movement and a significant figure in Surrealism, known for his abstract art that took inspiration from nature. The original work from 1931 exists in multiple versions and materials, including plaster, marble, and bronze. This example is the original in marble in the collection of the Centre Pompidou in Paris.
January 19, 2026 at 5:15 PM
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Liberation of the Peon
fresco on cement
1931
José Diego María Rivera
(Mexican, 1886–1957)

#diegorivera #liberationofthepeon #dated1931 #mexico #mexicanidad #revolutionaryart #politicalart #socialism #mexicanart #mexicanartist #fresco #painting #art
Diego Rivera’s Liberation of the Peon makes visible the cruel and exploitative Mexican peonage system, which kept agricultural workers in servitude to the owners of large properties, or haciendas, until they could pay off a debt by work. The laborers (peons) were routinely subject to brutal punishment. In this fresco painting, a hacienda worker has been tied to a post, whipped, and left for dead by his overseers. Four revolutionary soldiers have come to his rescue. In the distance, a hacienda building burns. Rivera based this painting on a fresco he had created in 1923 in Mexico City as part of a series narrating the history of the Mexican people and their struggles during the 1910–20 Mexican Revolution. The composition is a secular adaptation of a famous fresco, The Lamentation of Christ, painted by the Italian artist Giotto in about 1435 at the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua.
June 25, 2025 at 3:42 PM
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Parábola óptical
[Optic Parable]
photograph
1931
Manuel Álvarez Bravo
(1902-2002)

#photography #manuelalvarezbravo #dated1931 #parabolaoptical #opticparable #surrealism #surrealistphotography #mexicanphotography #mexicansurrealism #surrealistart #art
Manuel Álvarez Bravo (February 4, 1902 – October 19, 2002) was a Mexican artistic photographer and one of the most important figures in 20th century Latin American photography. He was born and raised in Mexico City. While he took art classes at the Academia Nacional de Bellas Artes, his photography is self-taught. His career spanned from the late 1920s to the 1990s with its artistic peak between the 1920s and 1950s. His hallmark as a photographer was to capture images of the ordinary but in ironic or Surrealistic ways. His early work was based on European influences, but he was soon influenced by the Mexican muralism movement and the general cultural and political push at the time to redefine Mexican identity. He rejected the picturesque, employing elements to avoid stereotyping. He had numerous exhibitions of his work, worked in the Mexican cinema and established Fondo Editorial de la Plástica Mexicana publishing house. He won numerous awards for his work, mostly after 1970. His work was recognized by the UNESCO Memory of the World registry in 2017. “The countryside, the daily life of the street is so much richer than doing portraits, than doing nudes.” Manuel Álvarez Bravo Manuel Álvarez Bravo was a teenager when he first picked up a camera and began taking pictures, before he enrolled in night classes in painting at the Academia San Carlos, in 1917, or sought instruction in the darkroom of local German photographer Hugo Brehme. Initially self-taught, Álvarez Bravo’s style developed through study of foreign and local photography journals. In these pages, he first encountered the work of Edward Weston and Tina Modotti, who came to Mexico in 1923; the latter became a close colleague and supporter, introducing Álvarez Bravo to the artists of Mexico’s avant-garde, including Diego Rivera, Frida Khalo, and Rufino Tamayo, as well as encouraging him to send photographs to Weston. In the 1930s, Álvarez Bravo met Paul Strand, traveling with him while he worked in Mexico, and Henri Cartier-Bresson. With Cartier-Bresson and Walker Evans he exhibited in a three-man show at the Julien Levy Gallery, New York, in 1935. Mexico was a cultural hub for many in the international avant-garde in these years; André Breton visited, including Álvarez Bravo in the Exposition of Surrealism he organized in 1940 in Mexico City. Although the artist never identified with Surrealism, it was a major theme in the analysis of his pictures throughout his career. Revealing the influence of his formative years following the Mexican Revolution of 1910, Álvarez Bravo would instead speak of his interest in representing the cultural heritage, peasant population, and indigenous roots of the Mexican people in the face of rapid modernization.
June 17, 2025 at 5:44 PM