Photography Tina Modotti (SIGLO XX) by Archivo El Sol de MéxicoFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Tina Modotti is: a myth, an actress, a photographer, a revolutionary, a communist militant, a political refugee and a member of the International Red Aid. A person who acted in opposition to the role of woman in the social imaginary of the first part of the 20th century, but not from a challenging attitude, but from her personality. A woman who worked for social justice all her life.
In this photograph she appears on December 3, 1929, at the opening of the exhibition -of the newly Autonomous- National University of Mexico. This exhibition marks Tina's life in three aspects.
The first is a way of reclaiming her image affected by the murder trial of Julio Antonio Mella, a Cuban revolutionary and Tina's partner. The second point, which shows the vast majority of Tina's photographs, since she became a photographer in Mexico and almost stopped being one after her deportation, she abandoned it to dedicate herself to a revolutionary life in Europe as an active militant of communism in favor of social justice. It's kind of a retrospective. Thirdly, Tina, happy and committed to art, ended with her departure from Mexico, the country with which, according to her own words, she had an electric relationship,which invited her to be a better lover, a better photographer, a better disciple and better person.
Photography negative Tina Modotti The coat of the tiger movie (SIGLO XX) by Archivo El Sol de MéxicoFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Tina was born in 1896 in Udine, Italy, she worked from a very young age in a textile factory. At 16, she traveled to San Francisco to reach out to her father and sister. Upon her arrival, she joined the Theater Company of Italian Immigrants. There she met her husband, the poet Roubaix de l'Abrie Richey, known as Robo, together with him, she mixed in the world of art and cinema, it was very stimulating for her, so she tried her luck as an actress and model in silent movies. Here she is seen in the foreground of the film The Tigers Coat (1920), in which she curiously plays the role of a Mexican Indian. Her beauty was her great ally, and at that time Tina's job was to pose, to be a model for film directors, for her husband and also for whom she would become her lover Edward Weston.
Edward Weston with his camera (ca. 1924, plata sobre gelatina) by Tina Modotti (Údine, Italia, 1896-Ciudad de México, 1942) INBAL / Museo Nacional de Arte, Donación Galería de Arte Whitechapel Londres, 1983 © D.R. Museo Nacional de Arte / Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura, 2017.Fototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Edward Weston was his teacher, his interlocutor with art and the person with whom he arrived in Mexico in 1923.
This photograph is one of the first portraits taken by Tina, and Edwardito, as she called him, could not be missing from her photographs. Here she shows him in his job, behind the camera that appears in the foreground, and he looking at the horizon as if looking for the perfect angle. Just as he taught her in all the years they worked together, and even after thei separation in 1926, this is demonstrated by the letters they wrote to each other talking about art and craft, leaving through this correspondence a kind of Tina's artistic diary.
Photography Tina Modotti, Glasses (SIGLO XX) by Archivo El Sol de MéxicoFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Edward Weston taught him to observe textures, light and shadow, the simplicity of figures, and to find beauty in simplicity. The studies of architectural details and objects were the product of his closeness to Weston. Unlike him, who believed that the creative moment occurred at the moment of pressing the button; Tina had no objection to the manipulation inside the darkroom. This photograph of The Vases is an example, in which the original negative was worked to achieve an image that highlights the geometry of the vessels in different sizes and superimposed in an impossible way in real life. These types of works are considered aesthetically close to the group of Mexican artists known as Estridentistas (1921 - 1927) who were fascinated by the urban world, machines and the future.
Photography Tina Modotti, Roses (SIGLO XX) by Archivo El Sol de MéxicoFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Tina took several photographs of flowers and plants, concentrating on the play between light and shadow.
Photography José Chávez, Xavier Guerrero, David Alfaro Siqueiros, Enrique González y Diego Rivera (SIGLO XX) by Archivo El Sol de MéxicoFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Upon her arrival in Mexico, Tina surrounded herself with great personalities from the artistic world who also shared with her the ideals of communism and were even part of the Communist Party of Mexico, such as Diego Rivera and David Alfaro Siqueiros.
Her closeness with the muralists was not only labor or affective, since there was a proximity with them in terms of her attitude towards life and perception of the reality of the 1920s. Together they created an artistic and cultural proposal in which the Mexican and Soviet revolutions, the avant-garde and nationalism converged. They built a new artistic language that they integrated into the Mexican imaginary that was shared by a generation of Mexican and foreign artists who lived in Mexico and continued until the 1950s and who still continue to identify Mexicans today.
Bandwagon, corn and guitar (1927, plata sobre gelatina) by Tina Modotti (Údine, Italia, 1896-Ciudad de México, 1942) INBAL / Museo Nacional de Arte, Donación Galería de Arte Whitechapel Londres, 1983 © D.R. Museo Nacional de Arte / Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura, 2017.Fototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Canana, corn and guitar is an example of this new Mexican and revolutionary artistic language that Tina elaborated for El Machete, a Mexican newspaper published by the Union of Revolutionary Workers, Technicians, Painters, Sculptors and Engravers of Mexico.
Peasant rally with backs "hats" (ca. 1928, plata sobre gelatina) by Tina Modotti (Údine, Italia, 1896-Ciudad de México, 1942) INBAL / Museo Nacional de Arte, Donación Vittorio Vidali. Fototeca INAH, 1983 © D.R. Museo Nacional de Arte / Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura, 2017.Fototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
One of Tina's emblematic publications in the newspaper El Machete is the one that shows us the walk of many peasants, represented only by their hats, which allude to the celebration of May 1, Labor Day. Her art turns towards its most revolutionary sense, without stopping exploring with photography.
Photo negative, Girl with bucket (SIGLO XX) by Archivo El Sol de MéxicoFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Tina, committed to her two passions, built her own style that was permeated by Weston's teachings and her social convictions, impregnating her art with a more human vision of photography. Without this mixture we would not have the image of a girl with a bucket, in which the play between light and shadow exalts the multiplicity of textures from the fineness of the mud, to the porosity of the girl's skin dried by the sun; highlighting her crestfallen face that reflects her work and effort involved in carrying those buckets of water. With her photograph, Tina begins to portray the Mexico of the 1920s, in a kind of photographic journalism, although with her expression of silence on the faces that convey the silent suffering of misery.
Elegance and poverty (ca. 1928, plata sobre gelatina) by Tina Modotti (Údine, Italia, 1896-Ciudad de México, 1942) INBAL / Museo Nacional de Arte, Donación Galería de Arte Whitechapel Londres, 1983 © D.R. Museo Nacional de Arte / Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura, 2017.Fototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
The painter Xavier Guerrero, whom Tina had known since 1922, managed to win her heart through the shared interests of communism. With Weston's departure they formalized their relationship. Xavier Guerrero, greatly influenced her love for Mexico, thanks to him, she understood the problems of the country and the people. As with this photomontage, in which Tina shows the contrast of social classes in Mexico in the 1920s.
Tina Modotti in a journalistic note (SIGLO XX) by La PrensaFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
In the facilities of El Machete Newspaper, Tina met the Cuban Julio Antonio Mella, they say it was love at first sight. Mella activist against the Cuban dictatorship and supporter of the Communist Party. Both ended the relationships they had to give themselves to a free and full of passion love like Tina had never experienced before.
This photograph was taken by Tina days before Mella's murder, in it you can see the mastery in portraiture and in exalting textures, as well as chiaroscuro. Contrasting with another in which she captures the leader, the strong and determined visionary; while here she captures the lover in a soft, sweet, dreamlike image.
Tina Modotti in a journalistic note (SIGLO XX) by La PrensaFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Tina and Julio Antonio were not only lovers, but also shared other passions such as equality and the search to honor the work of the workers. On the night of January 10, 1929, Tina and Julio Antonio were walking towards their house and upon reaching the intersection of Abraham González and Morelos streets, two shots were heard that wounded Julio Antonio, who fell to the ground. Mella died in hospital in the early hours of January 11. Despite the fact that everything pointed to a political crime planned by the Machado government, police chief Valente Quintana, an enemy of the communists and foreigners, insisted on forcing the line of investigation towards a passionate homicide of whom the main suspect was Tina.
Tina Modotti in a journalistic note (SIGLO XX) by La PrensaFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Police chief Valente Quintana did everything to justify his line of investigation: a crime of passion. To do this, he had Tina's house searched and revealed elements of her personal life, as well as some nude photographs that Weston had taken of her on the roof of her house in Tacubaya.
The press was fascinated with the material delivered, so the trial became almost a serial novel for the Mexican society of the time, since Tina's life was exposed. A woman who was able to live with men without getting married, change partners openly; walking alone on the street, not wearing stockings, smoking in public and going out at night to fashionable places with various men, she was a woman with no scruples, no reputation!
Tina Modotti in a journalistic note (SIGLO XX) by La PrensaFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Tina faced several interrogations, until the investigation became a vicious circle, since the police chief's questions insisted on getting her to confess the name of the murderer that she did not know. In the end, Quintana was removed from the trial and the autopsy revealed that the bullet wounds Mella received had been in the back, which supported Tina Modotti's testimony.
In this photograph Tina appears together with her lawyers, in a trial that lasted five days.
Tina Modotti in a journalistic note (SIGLO XX) by La PrensaFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Diego Rivera, president of the Mexican Communist Party, and a great friend of Tina, was attentive to the trial, and the Party even hired some investigators to help clarify the murder. When the nude portraits of Tina, as well as the letter she wrote to Xavier Guerrero to explain that he had fallen in love with Mella and that they should break up, were published in the newspapers; Rivera along with other prominent artists came out to defend her:
“All of her friends know the following qualities of her. Being endowed with an artistic talent... knowing how to bravely face life, earning a living with her own work, dedicating the best and most of it to the defense of workers' and peasants' demands. We have seen in distant places of Agrarian Committees, the works of art in which, with an admirable synthesis, Tina expresses the aspirations and essential rights of the peasants. We have seen in the pages of the most refined magazines reproduced the works in which, with the hands of photography, Tina reaches the purest aesthetic expressions”.
Miguel Covarrubias in a journalistic note (SIGLO XX) by El Sol de MéxicoFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Miguel Covarrubias, plastic artist and friend of Tina also protested against the people who tried to make Edward Weston's photographs look like they were pornography, even though they are works of art. “Tina Modotti is an honorable woman because she never traded the beauty with which nature endowed her, and she had, with her head held high before everyone, the value of her affections. Like thousands of beautiful women, she was able to acquire riches and subdue social considerations through a wise administration of her charms; her talent is more than enough for it. She, on the other hand, preferred to be truly a worker and fight for the interests of her class brothers. But it is very easy for men shielded by anonymity to attack a woman with newspaper editorials.”
Photography Carlos Chávez (SIGLO XX) by Archivo ESTOFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Carlos Chávez also came out in his defense, "I have seen the photographs of Tina Modotti referred to in the editorial, published today, and it seems to me that it is silly to confuse photographs, nude works of art, with vile pornographic postcards."
Photography David Alfaro Siqueiros, Satish Gujral y Roberto Montenegro (SIGLO XX) by Archivo ESTOFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
Roberto Montenegro, plastic artist, cultural manager and a man of class; he let the society of that moment see his annoyance against the opinion of the editorialist who ruthlessly and intentionally confuses the meaning of Tina's nudes, making the public believe in the immorality of said photographs. For Montenegro as for many others, it was clear that the purpose of that editorial was to discredit Tina's image; however, it was not only her image that was damaged, in those days of the trial, despite her self-control, something broke inside Tina. All of her friends realized that her character and behavior underwent a great change after Mella's murder and the campaign against her. She wore exclusively dark-colored clothing and devoted herself more fervently than ever to her political work.
Tehuana with jicalpextle (stick bottom). (ca. 1928, plata sobre gelatina) by Tina Modotti (Údine, Italia, 1896-Ciudad de México, 1942) INBAL / Museo Nacional de Arte, Donación Galería de Arte Whitechapel Londres, 1983 © D.R. Museo Nacional de Arte / Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura, 2017.Fototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
After the loss of her great love, as well as the days spent deprived of her freedom, Tina, who was a woman with great strength, took time to rebuild her life. In August 1929, while on the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, Tina regained her strength and rediscovered photography, although not for long, as this series of Tehuantepec would be one of the last she took in Mexico and almost the farewell to her time as a photographer.
Tina manages in the photographs of these women to reflect the empathy, the closeness and the eye of the humanist photographer that she was hers.
Although this image is not a portrait, nor can the Tehuana's face be clearly appreciated, we can see her serious and calm expression; just as we notice that it is a woman walking in her daily life; we could doubt whether or not this woman posed for Tina. This type of frozen images of reality where they reflect the essence of people is one of Tina's arts. Tina's photograph represents a woman, no matter who she is, but who she represents: the Tehuana women, who at that time were a symbol of feminism, of the value of women, an image that the artists of that time took as a symbol of Mexico and women.
Girl suckling. (ca. 1928, plata sobre gelatina) by Tina Modotti (Údine Italia, 1896-Ciudad de México, 1942) INBAL / Museo Nacional de Arte, Donación Galería de Arte Whitechapel Londres, 1983 © D.R. Museo Nacional de Arte / Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura, 2017.Fototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
The image of a girl breastfeeding, renounces any social context, represents an exclusively feminine activity, without any taboos or complexes when showing the act of breastfeeding, again taking photography as a means to exalt the fact, the action or the person, as well as what he did with all the photographs he took of peasants or workers. Let us think that Tina is a pioneer in these photographs and that later these themes were taken up by photographers who followed her, as well as the discourse of Mexicanness. Without a doubt, as the artists let it be seen when they came out of it to defend it from it, Tina Modotti is one of those responsible for some of the symbols that we still recognize today as Mexicans.
Tina Modotti in a journalistic note (SIGLO XX) by La PrensaFototeca, Hemeroteca y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña
In the 1920s in Mexico, Tina developed her artistic talent, in a country that she considered her homeland; in a few years where she lived as she wanted and with whom she wanted, following her convictions, without caring if with them she broke with the rules established in the collective imaginary of society.
On February 5, 1930, there was an attack against President Pascual Ortíz Rubio, and throughout the country members of the communist party were arrested. She spent 13 days in jail, and when she got out she had 48 hours to leave her house and Mexico. Vittorio Vidali, a member of her Party and a Comintern envoy, accompanied her all the way to Berlin.She spent 6 months and had to travel to Moscow where she began her work in International Red Aid. There she began a relationship with Vidali, who would be her last partner.
In the spring of 1939, Tina and Vittorio arrived in Mexico again. Tina entered with another identity, since she was still a persona non grata. Just as Mexico City had changed its landscape, so had Tina, since Mella's death and her deportation, she left photography forever to dedicate herself to activism, however the pact between Stalin and Hitler hit her deep, it's as if his whole life of struggle would have lost meaning. Tina, even having recovered her legal stay in Mexico through President Lázaro Cárdenas, did not frequent all her friends from before, that happy, brave and convinced Tina, was trapped in that photograph of the inauguration of her photographic work. She died, alone in a taxi in the early hours of January 7, 1942.
Curatorship, Research and Texts:
Lorenza Espínola Gómez de Parada.
General coordination:
Dr. Marina Vázquez Ramos.
Investigation:
Arq. Irina Escartín Arciniega.
Yolanda Ramos Ortíz.
Translation to English:
Lorenza Espínola Gómez de Parada.
Translation to French:
Lorenza Espínola Gómez de Parada.
Multimedia Design:
Organización Editorial Mexicana.
Fototeca, Hemeroteca, y Biblioteca Mario Vázquez Raña.
Gratitude:
Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura.
Museo Nacional de Arte.
Subdirección General del Patrimonio Artístico Inmueble.
Carmen Gaitán Rojo.
Directora Museo Nacional de Arte.
Ana Leticia Carpizo González.
Subdirectora Museo Nacional de Arte.
Dolores Martínez Orralde.
Subdirectora General.
Subdirección General del Patrimonio Artístico Inmueble.
Archivo fotográfico El Sol de México.
Archivo fotográfico ESTO.
Periódico La Prensa.
Periódico El Sol de México.
Tely Duarte.
David Eduardo Caliz Manjarrez.
David A. Reyes Méndez.
Diana Pérez Barrera.
Lidia Isaura Luján López.
