Diego Rivera as epic modernist

Art historian David Craven presents a sustained and highly original interpretation of Diego Rivera's particular version of "epic modernism," while offering a probing and coherent account of the artist's lifelong political activism. Drawing on both new primary documents and the best of recent secondary literature, Craven considers what Rivera's work in the public sphere has come to signify, and examines the artist's ongoing legacy for "post-colonial" discourse.

The study features a careful formal analysis of Rivera's most important paintings. Besides addressing his rediscovery of pre-Columbian art, Craven analyzes the artist's use of narrative, iconographic programs and the fresco technique for most well-known mural cycles, which continued to draw structurally on his early avant-garde work.