Imprints of Revolution: Visual Representations of Resistance
302
Imprints of Revolution: Visual Representations of Resistance
302eBook
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Overview
Imprints of Revolution highlights how revolutions and revolutionary moments are historically constructed and locally contextualized through the visual. It explores a range of spatial and temporal formations to illustrate how movements are articulated, reconstituted, and communicated. The collective work illustrates how the visual serves as both a mobilizing and demobilizing force in the wake of globalization. Radical performances, cultural artefacts, architectural and fashion design as well as social and print media are examples of the visual mediums analysed as alternative archives that propose new understandings of revolution. The volume illustrates how revolution remains significant in visually communicating and articulating social change with the ability to transform our contemporary understanding of local, national, and transnational spaces and processes.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781783485079 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. |
| Publication date: | 05/02/2016 |
| Series: | Disruptions |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 302 |
| File size: | 17 MB |
| Note: | This product may take a few minutes to download. |
| Age Range: | 18 Years |
About the Author
Guadalupe García is Assistant Professor of History at Tulane University.
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Read an Excerpt
Imprints of Revolution
Visual Representations of Resistance
By Lisa B. Y. Calvente, Guadalupe García
Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc.
Copyright © 2007 Lisa B. Y. Calvente and Guadalupe GarcíaAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-78348-507-9
CHAPTER 1
Icons of Revolution
Constructions of Emiliano Zapata in Prints of the Mexican Revolution
Theresa Avila
The Mexican Revolution erupted in 1910 in response to an oppressive thirty-year dictatorship under José de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz (1876–1910). Aggressive development during the Porfiriato resulted in modernization and economic growth in Mexico, but progress came at a high cost. The Porfirian regime's methods for stabilizing Mexico and making resources available for foreign investment and development included coercion and violence, as well as land seizures from small property owners and forced displacement of indigenous groups and villages. Once in place, domestic and foreign agricultural and industrial complexes benefited from preferential treatment from the Porfirian regime in the form of legislation, biased arbitration, and (in some instances) military support.
In response to the injustices and oppression suffered under Porfirio Díaz, outbreaks of rebellion occurred across Mexico throughout the Porfiriato. There was no single issue that motivated individuals to revolt, but reasons included various grievances related to land rights, labor disputes, lack of civil liberties, and an unjust and violent political system. However, Francisco Madero's revolt against Porfirio Díaz, launched on November 20, 1910, has been designated as the official beginning of the Mexican Revolution. The war lasted a decade between 1910 and 1920. Following the devastation of ten years of war, the nation rebuilt. The ideologies and issues that motivated the insurrection were made seminal to the reconstruction of the nation through narratives and invented traditions.
The Taller de Gráfica Popular (Workshop for Popular Graphic Art), or TGP, is a graphic art collective founded in Mexico City in 1937 that was motivated by the goals and legacy of the Mexican Revolution. The TGP's 1947 portfolio Estampas de la Revolución Mexicana (Prints of the Mexican Revolution) consists of eighty-five linocut prints created by sixteen member artists. The album remarks on three distinct periods of Mexican history: one through nineteen address the dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz (1876–1910); twenty through fifty-seven present the violent phase of the Mexican Revolution (1910–1920); and fifty-eight through eighty-five deal with the postwar era in Mexico (1920s–1940s). A "prologue" introduces the project and brief textual captions provide some context for each image.
The figures represented within the portfolio are significant to and symbolic of the historical events, issues, and ideologies associated with the Mexican Revolution. Key figures within the graphic series, based on the number of times represented or referenced, are Porfirio Díaz, Francisco Madero, Venustiano Carranza, Álvaro Obregón, Lázaro Cárdenas, and Emiliano Zapata. National recognition was a tribute paid to these men as part of the process of invention and institutionalization of the war, which promoted most of them as national heroes of the Mexican Revolution. In the graphic series, the TGP heroicized some of these individuals and the collective demonized others.
Emiliano Zapata (1879–1919), the general of the Southern Army of the Mexican Revolution, is the most emphasized figure in the TGP's portfolio on the war. The image of Zapata has a rich and complex history that spans nearly a century. During the rebellion, and more so after his death, Zapata is seen as an agent and symbol of social justice and land reform. Zapata's involvement began as a fight for the reclamation of land and resources on behalf of the disenfranchised villagers of his hometown, Anenecuilco, in the state of Morelos. In this effort, Zapata fought for and promoted agrarian reform and regional autonomy in the form of grassroots self-government. Therefore, fundamentally, the image of Zapata correlates with the concepts of the egalitarian distribution of land, the decentralization of government, and rebellion in the name of justice. Symbolically, Zapata has become the personification of the Mexican Revolution, Mexican national identity, Mexican cultural heritage, and social justice. However, it is important to realize that diverse applications frame Zapata within a variety of contexts and represent him in multiple forms, thus indicating the importance he holds as a symbol, but also making clear the multiplicity of meanings attached to Zapata.
Examination of a select number of prints of Zapata from the TGP's Prints of the Mexican Revolution explains how and for what purposes the revolutionary has been remembered, constructed, and transformed into an icon of revolution. Analysis of the visual, textual, historical, and narratological elements in the series of prints reveals the interplay of distinct narratives of the war in the TGP's portfolio, which alludes to the evolving and multiplicitous nature of the legacy of the war. Tracing the narrative(s) of Zapata that the TGP wove into the series of prints, this chapter makes evident the objectives of the TGP for the portfolio. However, although Zapata is represented in nine distinct prints, I will only discuss a select number and focus my discussion on elements that clearly express the focus and intent of the portfolio.
The TGP took the traditional concept of the artisanal workshop and transformed it into a site for artistic production and training motivated by a sense of social justice and political action. The graphic images of the TGP worked to inform and educate the people of Mexico, as well as an international audience. As activists, the artist members of the TGP promoted and lobbied for progressive labor laws, access to education, and control of natural resources. Topics at the core of the workshop's prints include Mexico's heritage and history, the poverty and oppression of the Native American population, human rights, and civil liberties. In alignment with international efforts, the artists in the TGP confronted violence as a state-sanctioned means of social control, encouraged socialism, and remained conscious of global issues in their work. The TGP circulated their prints worldwide and connected with and incorporated numerous international artists.
In Prints of the Mexican Revolution, the TGP embraced the origins of the war while it grappled and interacted with the rebellion's history and legacy. The TGP's portfolio is actually a sort of pastiche or collage of narratives of the war. In the the portfolio's "prologue," the TGP describes the motivations behind the portfolio as a response to then president Miguel Alemán's call to "honor and aggrandize Mexico" and a changing political climate. The workshop declared the intended purpose of the album was to "battle against enemies of the insurgency of 1910" and to "revive in an illustrative form the heroic struggle of our country for 'Land and Liberty.'" This statement makes clear the TGP's understanding of the goals of the Mexican Revolution and the ideological focus of the portfolio. In this opening statement, the TGP also indicates their intent to teach the public about the revolutionary struggle of 1910–1920 through the portfolio, which clearly indicates the purposeful nature of what is included, represented, omitted, and expressed.
The first nineteen prints of the TGP's graphic series chronicle the tyranny of Porfirio Díaz's dictatorship and focus on the most egregious systems and tactics of the regime to pacify, control, and develop Mexico. Among this set, the artist Mariana Yampolsky introduces Emiliano Zapata as he confronts the tyranny of the Porfirian-era hacienda system. In the eighth print of the portfolio, "La Juventud de Emiliano Zapata: Lección Objetiva" ("The Youth of Emiliano Zapata: An Important Lesson"), a young Zapata stands looking out across a sprawling agricultural estate (figure 1.1). During the Porfirian regime, the expansion and domination of large agricultural estates swelled, which disrupted organization of local labor, agricultural production, and economic systems that resulted in the informal colonization of rural Mexico by the domestic elite and by foreign investors and companies. In print 8, Yampolsky describes multiple scenes of abuse suffered by agrarian laborers on these haciendas and indicates how the hacienda system and landscape are instruments of power that encouraged and reinforced uneven development in Mexico.
The text caption connected to this image narrates a key moment of a mythic tale about Zapata as a young man, reading:
"And why don't the people of the villages come together and take back the land that has been taken away?" Emiliano Zapata asked his father back in the days of his youth. "No son," replied the future leader's father — "nothing can be done against the hacendado's agricultural estates and businessess." In response, Emiliano questioned, "It cannot be done? Let me grow up and they will see that I can recover the lands taken from us." His father's words stayed with him.
The reference to an often-repeated tale about Zapata, who as a youth promised to take back the land stolen from his fellow villagers, harkens to a common myth and the revolutionary's commitment to the issue of agrarian and political reform. The image can be read as a precursor to the conversation between father and son, where Zapata is troubled after seeing the extent of suffering on the hacienda before him and seeks out his father. Although this moment between father and son would have likely taken place near their own village of Anenecuilco, the text and image are nonspecific about location. Instead, the ambiguity of location in the image expands the significance and problems related to land rights, the hacienda system, and labor rights to all of Mexico.
Yampolsky locates Zapata as witness to the working and living conditions on the hacienda and by doing so indicates that the agrarian issue was of personal concern to him. Furthermore, by isolating and making him the sole witness, the artist alludes to Zapata as the only one willing or able to take the land back. Yampolsky further denotes Zapata's intimate association with the agrarian community by dressing him in the traditional attire of rural laborers, white cotton calzones. As Samuel Brunk has documented, Zapata's parents were farmers who worked their own plot of village land; therefore, we can assume that Zapata donned the typical attire while performing this type of labor on his own land. As the uniform of the Zapatistas, the calzone also operates as a symbol for Zapata's rebellion and participation in the Mexican Revolution, and, more important, it signifies his demands for agrarian reform.
This image and its narrative attest to Zapata's personal experience with and concern over the agrarian issue, as well as marking him as a key symbol for the ideological platform of agrarian reform. As the first image that introduces Zapata, print 8 establishes how the TGP define him in the portfolio. As the first image of a leader of the Mexican Revolution to be addressed in the portfolio, Zapata is identified as the principal revolutionary for the TGP. This also makes it clear that his ideology most closely aligns with that of the TGP and that the organization promoted land rights as a primary issue for them, as well as the Mexican Revolution and its legacy. Thus, in the portfolio, as in the master narratives of the war, Zapata is the historical and symbolic figure, above all others, who constitutes and represents the rural community of Mexico and the agrarian issue.
Zapata plays a significant role within the portfolio and is a principal figure in the group of prints that mark the start of the violent phase of the Mexican Revolution. Zapata's insurgency was part of a larger movement in response to the tyrannical oppression of the Porfirian regime across Mexico. The revolutionary was elected village council president in September 1909, and from that point forward he assumed leadership of the local land struggle in his village of Anenecuilco. Zapata took decisive action in the spring of 1910 when he gathered eighty armed men to protect local villagers who farmed land that was in dispute. Initially, Zapata acted in relation to his local situation, but over time he became aware of Francisco Madero's movement, the Plan of San Luis Potosi, and the wave of rebellion that was occurring across the nation. Article 3 in Madero's declaration addresses the restitution of land unjustly taken by the Porfirian regime from small land owners primarily from the lower classes and motivated the southern rural faction of the war, led by Zapata, to join his effort. When Zapata joined Madero's rebellion on March 10, 1911, it was in alliance with other local leaders, as well as in unison with a national movement. After a shaky start and sporadic bursts of rebellion across the country, a major battle was fought and won at Ciudad Juarez. The outcome was the signing of the Peace Treaty of Ciudad Juarez in May 1911. On May 25, 1911, Porfirio Díaz submitted his resignation to the Mexican congress per the treaty, and the first phase of violence came to an end. Madero was democratically elected president of Mexico in October 1911.
In print 24, "Emiliano Zapata, Lider de la Revolución Agraria" ("Emiliano Zapata, Leader of the Agrarian Revolution"), TGP artist member Francisco Mora heralds Zapata's significance in the war and, more important, to the TGP (figure 1.2). Locating Zapata at the beginning of the section of the portfolio that addesses the violent stage of the Mexican Revolution marks him as a crucial actor. Mora depicts Zapata on horseback, armed, and at the forefront of a dense group of armed men also on horseback. The print's caption states:
General Emiliano Zapata was the Agrarian Leader par excellence. His life is an example of ongoing militancy in favor of the dispossessed of his time. His thinking is embodied in the Plan of Ayala, and over many years, without compromising in any way, he fought for the realization of his noble social ideas. His name and his efforts are revered by all in the rural community of the Republic and in numerous foreign countries.
This text offers an abbreviated summation of Zapata's effort and character. The print alludes to the revolutionary general's rise to power in a manner that resonates with both the personal story and the national dominant narrative, as well as capturing the symbolic meanings attached to Zapata.
In print 24, Mora incorporates the Zapatistas' trademark slogan "Tierra y Libertad" ("Land and Liberty"), which is emblazoned on the banner over the army behind Zapata. This text evokes the Zapatista manifesto, the Plan of Ayala. The slogan "Liberty, Justice, and Law" is the last declarative statement attached to this plan, which was circulated in December 1911. The plan was written to explain the goals of Zapatismo. It expressed Zapatismo's agenda as primarily land reform on a national scale, but it recognized the significance of political power in this endeavor and promoted decentralized government by self-appointed leaders. Agrarian reform was defined in the Plan of Ayala as the nationalization of estate monopolies and the property owned by enemies of the Mexican Revolution through confiscation and redistribution of land to those who held titles and from whom the land had been unjustly taken. "Emiliano Zapata, Leader of the Agrarian Revolution," as the title of the print, not only describes Zapata's role within the Mexican Revolution but also emphasizes a particular agenda and ideology within the war and the portfolio.
The ambush assassination of Zapata is the subject of the fifty-seventh print of the portfolio, "La Muerte de Emiliano Zapata" ("The Death of Emiliano Zapata"), by Isidoro Ocampo (figure 1.3). The caption for the print declares:
April 10, 1919 is a day of mourning for the Mexican Revolution. In Chinameca, Morelos, the great revolutionary general Emiliano Zapata was shot dead as a victim of an ambush. After death, his significance grew over time and he is an example for all men who yearn to resolve the problems that plague the rural population of the Republic of Mexico.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Imprints of Revolution by Lisa B. Y. Calvente, Guadalupe García. Copyright © 2007 Lisa B. Y. Calvente and Guadalupe García. Excerpted by permission of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc..
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