By Alfredo Zalce
Located in Fairlawn, OH
Lumber Workers (Cuidad del Carmen, State of Campeche)
Color lithograph on wove paper, c. 1945
Signed lower right in pencil
From: Mexican Art - A Portfolio of Mexican People and Places
Edition: 250
Published by Associated American Artist and Taller Grafica de Popular (TGP)
This print is one of two supplemental color lithographs from a portfolio of ten black-and-white lithographs showing images of Mexican people engaged in daily activities, primarily labor and crafting, by ten different mid-century Mexican political printmakers and members of the Taller de Gráfica Popular print collective, printed on cream wove paper, each signed in pencil at lower right.
This image depicts the lumber industry in Campeche, one of the 31 states, located in Southeast Mexico, it is bordered by the states of Tabasco to the south west, Yucatán to the north east, and Quintana Roo to the east, and to the southeast by the Orange Walk district of Belize.
Campeche was part of the province of Yucatán but split off in the mid-19th century, mostly due to political friction with city of Mérida. Today, much of the state’s economic comeback is due to the finding of petroleum offshore in the 1970s, which has made the coastal cities of Campeche and Ciudad del Carmen important economic centers. The state has important Mayan and colonial sites but they are not as well known or visited as others in the Yucatán. (Courtesy Annex Galleries)
Condition: Excellent
Slight toning around the sheet edges
Image size: 11 3/8 x 14 1/8 inches
Sheet size: 15 x 17 3/4 inches
Reference: AAA Index 928
Alfredo Zalce Torres (12 January 1908 – 19 January 2003) was a Mexican artist and contemporary of Diego Rivera, David Siqueiros and other better-known muralists. He worked principally as a painter, sculptor, and engraver, also taught, and was involved in the foundation of a number of institutions of culture and education. He is perhaps best known for his mural painting, typically imbued with ”fervent social criticism”. He is acclaimed as the first artist to borrow the traditional material of coloured cement as the medium for a ”modern work of art”. Publicity-shy, he is said to have turned down Mexico's Premio Nacional de Ciencias y Artes before finally accepting it in 2001. Before his death, Sotheby's described him as ”the most important living Mexican artist up to date”.
Early life
A number of episodes from his childhood have been used to cast light on his future artistic career. Born in Pátzcuaro, Michoacán in 1908, as an infant he lived in Tacubaya during the Mexican Revolution; his school was near where the rival forces of Victoriano Huerta and Emiliano Zapata met in battle. One day he saw a dead body; he says that instead of fear his attitude was that of contemplation. According to a friend and prominent collector of his works, the young Alfredo began to draw aged six or seven, but chose to do so upon the linoleum floor of his home; nevertheless both his parents praised him. While at primary school, he regularly drew on the blackboard to accompany his teachers and illustrate their lessons, as encouragement to his fellow pupils.
Between 1924 and 1927 he studied at the Escuela Nacional de Artes Plásticas in Mexico City, where formative influences included Mateo Saldaña, Germán Gedovius and Diego Rivera.[3] He was soon on friendly terms with Diego Rivera as well as Rufino Tamayo, David Siqueiros, José Clemente Orozco and Frida Kahlo. As the oldest of three children, he took responsibility for the family after the death of his father; while a student, he studied in the mornings and worked in the afternoons so as to be able to provide financial support. He undertook further studies at the Escuela de Talla Directa and the Taller de Litografía of Emilio Amero.
Career
Much of Zalce's career was spent in teaching and cultural activities. He first went to Zacatecas to teach art but, since the Cristero War had ended only shortly before, the school was not permitted to operate owing to lingering political tensions. He taught drawing at various primary schools for the Secretariat of Education from 1932 to 1935. In 1944, he became a teacher at the La Esmeralda and Escuela Nacional de Artes Plásticas. He moved to Morelia in 1950 and became the director of the Escuela de Pintura y Escultura. He also worked as a professor at the Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León and the Escuela Popular de Bellas Artes.[3] Besides teaching, he illustrated books with academic and social themes. He was a founder or cofounder of the Escuela de Pintura of Tabasco, the Taller de Gráfica Popular, the Escuela de Pintura of Taxco in Guerrero, the Taller de Artes Plásticas in Uruapan and the Escuela de Pintura y Artesanías in Morelia. He was also a founder of the Liga de Escritores y Artistas Revolucionarios in 1933; one of its first missions was to oppose the favourable attitude at the time of many in Mexico towards Adolf Hitler.
In 1930, he created a mural for the primary school in Ayotla, State of Mexico. In 1932, he worked in ”fresco” at the Escuela para Mujeres in Mexico City. He painted murals in the former Talleres Gráficos de la Nación in 1936; again in collaboration with Leopoldo Méndez at the Escuela Normal de Puebla in 1938; and at the Palacio de Gobierno and the Cámera de Diputados in Michoacán with Ángel Bracho...
Category
1940s American Modern Art
