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Although Mexico’s contribution to social-movement murals is well documented, much less is known about Mexico’s activist graphic arts history. Leopoldo Méndez (1902-1969) was a printmaker and activist in numerous political and artistic groups, but he reached his incandescent peak as founding member and de-facto leader of the Taller de Gráfica Popular (variously translated as Popular Graphic Arts Workshop or People’s Graphic Art Workshop, TGP). It is a resounding tragedy that the TGP, one of the most significant loci of mid-20th century social movement printmaking, is virtually unknown in the United States. This is only partly explained by the usual disability of Anglocentrism; the deeper roots have to do with academia’s discomfort with political activism and with the general lack of scholarship in this country about political printmaking. Deborah Caplow’s excellent book goes a long way toward informing us about the explosive combination of art, artists, politics, and printmaking in Mexico during the mid-1900s. More than any previous work, Caplow’s book explains Méndez in the context of his time, analyzed through the organizations in which he participated and the other artists with whom he collaborated. By Lincoln Cushing, Art Historian

Review of a book by: Deborah Caplow, Leopoldo Méndez: Revolutionary Art and the Mexican Print. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2007.

Although Mexico’s contribution to social-movement murals is well documented, much less is known about Mexico’s activist graphic arts history. Leopoldo Méndez (1902-1969) was a printmaker and activist in numerous political and artistic groups, but he reached his incandescent peak as founding member and de-facto leader of the Taller de Gráfica Popular (variously translated as Popular Graphic Arts Workshop or People’s Graphic Art Workshop, TGP). It is a resounding tragedy that the TGP, one of the most significant loci of mid-20th century social movement printmaking, is virtually unknown in the United States. This is only partly explained by the usual disability of Anglocentrism; the deeper roots have to do with academia’s discomfort with political activism and with the general lack of scholarship in this country about political printmaking. Deborah Caplow’s excellent book goes a long way toward informing us about the explosive combination of art, artists, politics, and printmaking in Mexico during the mid-1900s. More than any previous work, Caplow’s book explains Méndez in the context of his time, analyzed through the organizations in which he participated and the other artists with whom he collaborated.

Mexico has a long history of printmaking in the service of social change, largely credited to the seminal work of José Guadalupe Posada (1852-1913), who was a printmaker and social critic during the Mexican Revolution. The TGP was founded in late 1937 after the collapse of the four-year-old Liga de Escritores y Artistas Revolucionarios (LEAR, Revolutionary Writers’ and Artists’ League). It brought together a dedicated cadre of political activists who happened to express themselves as printmakers. They worked collaboratively, issued editions as both fine-art prints for raising funds and free or cheap street posters for propaganda, and engaged in strategic acts of support for progressive candidates and issues. Although they occasionally generated lithographs, screenprints, and other media, their trademark expression was through linocuts –one or two color relief prints created from hand cut linoleum mounted on blocks. Prints were generally single sheet items, although some works are quite large for this medium (35 x 90 cm) and some were printed as two sheets and pasted together into one large poster.

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A Contra Corriente (article originally published in this journal)

// posted by Alice @ Friday, June 27, 2008