My amateur analysis
Wednesday, September 25, 2019 // The Statement
4B
5B
Wednesday, September 25, 2019 // The Statement
I
t is said that Frida Khalo despised gringolandia,
otherwise known as the United States. She was
deeply discomforted by what she called the
frivolous gringo culture, and passed most of her time in
the country feeling isolated and unfulfilled.
In 1932, during the time she spent in Detroit while
her husband, Diego Rivera, painted his famous “Detroit
Industry Murals,” she created her “Self Portrait Along
the Border Line Between Mexico and the United States.”
The composition shows her at the fringes of two
opposing cultures, one grey and grounded on machinery
and constant innovation, and the other organic and
held by tradition and the elements. It is in this contrast
between nature and industry that she expressed her
discomfort with the forged and poised gringo culture
and favored what seemed natural to her, Mexican
tradition.
On one side of the canvas, the Mexico side, Kahlo
painted two storming clouds. In one she depicted the
moon and, in the other, the sun. They touched in the
middle and created a storm, a natural phenomenon that
brings both life and destruction. On the American side,
she drew no clouds, only a thick fog of emissions that
radiated from a Ford factory. In this fog, she painted the
American flag.
This idea of exalting a country and its principles at
the expense of nature and personal joy was running
through my head as I entered the Rivera Court at the
Detroit Institute of Arts. I had been living in the United
States for over five years, and thought I had had enough
exposure to gringo culture to know that I agreed with
Kahlo.
All I could think about as I sat on a bench in the corner
of the Rivera Court was my experience as a Mexican in
the United States. I recalled the jarring culture shock
that came when I was introduced to a society that
seemed to only be preoccupied by hard work, on-paper
accomplishments and material possessions.
I went through junior high and high school filling out
one application after another, constantly trying to prove
to my classmates and teachers that I belonged and I was
not to be discarded; that I could adjust my way of being
to fit their rigid norms of acceptability.
I polished my image and self-expression in accordance
to the American code. I practiced, got rid of my accent,
dressed in American brands and followed typical
American teen rituals. I joined the dance team, dated
a football player and mostly spent all of my time trying
to do the “right” things to boost my college applications
— trying to be a productive and obedient member of the
American society because I felt it was the only way to
achieve “success.”
Those years made me feel like Kahlo in her self-
portrait. I was stuck in the middle of two cultures, not
really belonging to either, but striving to assimilate into
one and forget the other. I thought a definitive decision
had to be made. I was either going to become American,
which meant hiding my “Mexicaness,” or I was going
to be Mexican, which meant always being labeled as
different or incompatible.
It was this perceived rigidity of culture that led me
to sacrifice my Mexican mannerisms and traditions, so
I made a choice. It was a decision I saw as absolute and
necessary at the time. Like Kahlo, I felt like it had to be
either-or because they were so different, a clear line
separated them.
But when I came to the University of Michigan,
traveled to Detroit and inspected the little seed of my
culture that was planted there by Diego Rivera in 1933,
I realized that I did not completely agree with Kahlo’s
depiction of gringo culture. A lot of my ambivalence and
feelings of alienation remained, but Rivera managed to
make me feel included in his Mexican depiction of an
American narrative.
The Detroit Industry Murals were breathtaking. I
spent almost all of my time at the museum sitting on that
corner bench, looking at every face and detail in each of
the 27 frescoes painted by Rivera.
The North Wall, which contains three of the most
famous panels, shows the connections between nature
and technology. The story these three panels tell is
grounded in a common link, the only thing that is capable
of both tradition and innovation: the human mind.
The panel closest to the ceiling shows human hands
holding and extracting prime natural resources from the
earth. The middle panel shows these natural resources
being transformed by heat and funneled into the furnace
of the bottom panel, which depicts a Ford factory.
The Ford factory panel, at bottom panel of the North
Wall, depicts an echelon of contradictions. At the
very top is the burning furnace. It appears small in
the background, but it is connected to the rest of the
depictions in the panel by snakelike conveyor belts that
weave from side to side, separating various situations.
On the left side, the conveyor belt encases an
assembly line of glowing, green men who are seemingly
affected by the toxic chemicals they are forced to work
in. Automotive parts move in and out of their line
through suspended crates, but workers are unaffected.
Surrounded by heavy and dangerous looking machinery
and toxic chemicals, all they seem to worry about is their
work.
There is a clock in the background, near the top right
corner. It depicts the passage of time, but nobody seems
to be looking at it, as if their time was not their own.
Near the bottom is another assembly line, but this
one depicts workers that were drawn by Rivera without
sparing any details. They are focused and go on without
talking. They pull and push auto parts together, oblivious
to any danger and without risking a single, independent
thought.
At the very bottom, Rivera painted a series of grey
panels showing small figures in line. He drew lines
of people that form as they enter the factory, lines of
furnaces emitting clouds of pollution into the air, lines
of cars in parking lots and lines of men operating heavy
machinery.
This panel depicts the American industry and the
success driven Americans who work endlessly to make
it happen. In the back, like a tiny red dot, is the finished
product. The process seems to be more important
here than the car itself. Through this, and through his
multiracial depictions of the workers, Rivera emphasizes
gringo culture values as attempting to be diverse and
inclusive.
Rivera seemed to be a firm believer of the American
Dream — of the Mexican American dream.
The vertical flow that bridges the top panel to the
bottom one alludes to a linear narrative that connects
BY ANDREA PÉREZ-BALDERRAMA MANAGING STATEMENT EDITOR
See DIEGO, Page 6B
of Diego Rivera’s Detroit Industry Murals
PHOTOS BY ANDREA PÉREZ-BALDERAMA