The images and information presented below are for the instruction of students and scholarly research.
Jean Charlot
(1897-1979)
Though
French-born, Jean Charlot would become a well-known
Mexican painter and muralist, working alongside Diego
Rivera and others. Born to a French/Jewish/Mexican
mother, Charlot studied at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in
Paris.
The Tortilla Makers, 1937
The Hammock, 1937
During this time,
he became interested in Folk Art, which would later be
reflected in his Mexican compositions. This interest in
Folk Art was also what helped him to devote his themes
to the working class, family and humanity.
Mother and Child, 1930
Las Lavenderas, 1923
In the early 1920s,
Charlot’s mother introduced him to Mexico where his
grandfather lived. Shortly after his arrival he painted
his first mural at the National Preparatory School in
Mexico City. Charlot’s friends in the art world were
amazed at his talents as a lithographer and wood cutter,
skills that he brought with him from Europe. These
skills would later name his as a masterful color
lithographer.
Spear Thrower, 1974, silk screen
By mid 1925, Charlot
was in a Dark Period, creating mostly small easel
paintings. This was later followed by a stint as an
archeological artist for the Carnegie Institute at their
site in the Yucatan, Mexico. By 1930, Charlot had moved
to New York where he taught art at Columbia University,
and would later move to Athens, Georgia, and then
Colorado to teach art there as well. This marked the end
of Charlot’s stay in Mexico as he would travel and live
around the world for the rest of his life.
Fiesta Head Dress, 1933
While Charlot is
decidedly claimed by the Mexican art community, he also
created murals in Hawaii, Fiji, Kansas, Ohio and a
number of other places. Even though at this time Charlot
was either teaching or editing and writing art books, he
still managed to be a rather prolific artist. He
continued to create frescos and murals up until the year
before he died in Hawaii in 1979.
University of Hawaii mural, Relation
of Man and Nature
Even though Charlot
was not an exclusively Mexican painter, he helped to
bring forth the new modern movement among his Mexican
contemporaries. Today his works are part of the
permanent collections of The Museum of Modern Art and
The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York as well as
the Smithsonian Institution in San Francisco and the Art
Institute of Chicago.
