Rivera’s style is best termed as New Realism because it is far removed from the academic, Old World naturalism (Neimark 68). “He adopted a symbolic-representational style and a large scale mural format. The densely packed murals are almost montages of fragmentary figures and symbolic elements located within fictive spaces” (Neimark 69). The figures may have been simplified, but there is nothing simple about his complex compositions that are overwhelming to the eye, both visually and in terms of their social impact on society at the time (Neimark 69). Rivera’s murals at the Detriot Institute of Arts were painted with the 15th century Italian style technique called fresco, which is a method of applying paint directly to a wet plaster surface so that the work is permanently scarred onto the wall (Howlett 6). The project, designed to show the progress of man throughout time, fit perfect into Rivera’s style of a montage-like mural form. The murals received more than 86,000 visitors in the first month of its debut alone (Helms 85). At the end of the decade, Rivera was awarded the Fine Arts Gold Medal by the American Institution of Architects for Rivera’s growing work in the United States (Helms 70). However, happiness of receiving this award was short lived – in 1930, the conservative administration of the National School of Architecture and others had started a campaign for Rivera’s removal as director of the Academy of San Carlos, the same school he started out at as a young painter (Cockcroft 81).
In 1929, Rivera met and married Mexican surrealist Frida Kahlo (Tardiff 741). The two had a very rocky relationship, their marriage enduring mutual infidelity, bad health, and extensive and tiring world travel (Tardiff 742). At the end of the 1930’s, the two separated and divorced briefly before getting back together and remarrying (Helms 99). In 1955, following the death of Kahlo, Rivera announced to the public that he was battling cancer (Neimark 103). In 1957, Rivera was disabled from painting when a blood clot developed in his right arm (Tardiff 742). On November 27, 1957, Diego Rivera died (Tardiff 742). Thousands from around the world attended Rivera’s cremation ceremony as the Mexican government decreed that his ashes be placed next to other Mexican heroes at the Rotunda de los Hombres.
In 1933, Diego had started work on what is believed to be his most controversial piece entitled Man at the Crossroads. The Rockefeller family in New York had hired Diego Rivera to compose a mural in Radio City at the Rockefeller Center in New York City (Goldstein 50). Problems and conflict arose when a portrait of John Lenin, the first leader of the Communist-supporting Soviet Union, appeared in the mural (Goldstein 50). Riots and protests were high in tow as the Rockefeller family ordered Rivera to remove that piece from his mural (Goldstein 50). When Rivera refused, the mural was chipped off the wall and destroyed (Goldstein 50). However, Rivera was determined to complete the mural, but obviously in a different place. (Goldstein 50). After completing his murals at the New Workers School, which included the famous Workers of the World Unite panel, Rivera left the United States and returned once again to Mexico (Neimark 66). There, at the Palace of Fine Arts in Mexico City, he composed a new version of the Crossroads mural, now entitled Man, Controller of the Universe (Goldstein 50). Both works are labeled as having a Latin American Modernism context, the paintings both taking place in the movement of Mexican Muralism, the medium titled as fresco (Neimark 69).
Diego Rivera’s painting, Man at the Crossroads, reflects his strong stance in standing up for ones beliefs in a style of Latin American Modernism at the high times of Mexican Muralism and the Mexican Renaissance. Rivera never had a committed set style of art as his studies varied through the years, scaling between realist and abstract, modern and Picasso-signature style. His acute personal melodrama concerning his extra-marital status and his controversial beliefs dealing in politics made him one of the most fascinating painters of the twentieth century. Rivera’s work, brilliant in the eyes of many while insane in the eyes of others, has definitely left its mark on both American and Mexican society and culture, as well as the rest of the world nations across.