Tina Modotti Slide show

https://datebook.sfchronicle.com/art-exhibits/tina-modotti-photographer-who-intersected-with-artists-and-revolutionaries-honored-with-plaque-outside-onetime-s-f-home

https://twicemodern.wordpress.com/2013/11/20/women-photographers-tina-modotti/

https://www.artnet.com/artists/tina-modotti/

https://www.exibartstreet.com/news/tina-modotti-women-mexico-and-freedom/

https://www.mutualart.com/Artwork/Untitled–Sand—1929/BDE66884D7C55B09

https://photofocus.com/inspiration/on-photography-tina-modotti-1896-1942/

Tina Modotti

Tina was a free spirit, a brilliant woman who made her own choices.

Her father moved the family from Italy to California. He, and Tina’s Uncle opened a photography studio there. It was not very successful, though she had learned some photography there. She moved to Hollywood with her partner Robo. He was a poet and a painter. Tina became an actress staring in silent movies. The couple befriended many artists, but the most influential for Tina was Edward Weston. She spent hours with him as he taught her how to take photographs. A great love story began with the camera, and with Weston. In spite of this, Robo remained friends with them. He moved to Mexico urging Tina to follow. Shortly before she was to arrive Robo died. She came to Mexico with Weston. They opened a studio together. Weston photographed landscapes, and Modotti primarily people, and urban landscapes.

Tina befriended the bohemian artists like Diego Rivera, and Frida Kahlo. She joined the Mexican Muralists Movement, and was their photographer of choice. She became politically active and motivated. Communism became a passion of hers. Her work was radical, but romantic. It became a symbol of the working class at that time. This threatened the wealthy class in Mexico., and well as the interests of the United States exploiting the working class of Mexico. Many of her photographs were commissioned for radical publications. Her work was very politically charged. Her close friend Julio Antonia Mela was assassinated presumably by the Cuban government.

In 1929 she did her first one-woman retrospective at the National library in Mexico, after splitting with Weston.

In 1930 she was expelled from Mexico as a result of anticommunist, and anti-immigrant press campaign. She eventually made her way back to Italy where she was born to join the anti-fascist resistance, much like the terrifying fascist uprising we are witnessing today. After moving to Russia there is no evidence that Modotti photographed again. She eventually moved back to Mexico under a false name. Two years later she died in the back of a taxi in 1942. The cause of her death is a mystery. Some considered her death suspicious, questionable, and possibly politically motivated.

She had many love affairs throughout her life.

Her artistic output was pretty short relative to other artists.

It was said, “The tumultuous political environment she lived in left little room for her art”.

She was quoted as saying, “I can not solve the problem of life by losing myself in the problem of art”.

She became the standard-bearer for critic photojournalism.

Manuel Alverez Brando coined her work as both romantic and revolutionary.

She is buried in Mexico City, the city she loved

slide show for photography