Río Blanco, 7 de enero de 1907
Date: 1937
Medium: Lithograph
Dimensions (cm.): 39.4 x 32.3
Alternate titles: Unknown
Published edition: Numbered edition of 15; unknown number of impressions outside the edition. Méndez [1949?] gives number of impressions as 30 approx.
Contemporary publication:
1938 Calendar of the Universidad Obrera (printed by offset)
Revista Futuro, 7 enero 1938, cover
El Machete, 22 enero 1938
Jesús Cárdenas G., Los 30 dineros (Mexico City: Crasneda, 1947), cover
References: Méndez INBA 69; Prignitz 347
Commentary: One of the first projects of the TGP was a calendar for the Universidad Obrera in Mexico City. Méndez created the image for January 1938. His lithograph Río Blanco, with color added in the version published in the calendar, depicts the January 1907 labor uprising by textile workers near the city of Orizaba. In a surreal composition, unarmed workers face anonymous soldiers, inspiratied by the colossal figure of President Porfirio Díaz on a horse. Posed as an equestrian statue, the tyrant looms over his soldiers like a nightmare. The influence of Francisco Goya can be seen in the composition and lighting, reminiscent of Goya’s Executions of the Third of May, and his Disasters of War etchings. (Deborah Caplow)
Catalogue record number: 236