ArtCorner

Diego Rivera was born in Guanajuato, Mexico in 1886; his twin brother died a little over a year old and Rivera fell sick. On the advice of a doctor, the boy was sent to the mountains with his nanny, later boasting that she was the first of his many conquests. He established himself as a talented artist first drawing at age three. His father, wishing to spare the house walls decorated a room covered in paper for the child to paint on. Rivera would later say these were his first murals.

Rivera enrolled in an art school years later. He claimed that while a student, he and some friends decided to try cannibalism having heard that it would make them healthy and strong. The boys supposedly bought and ate cadavers making them strong and healthy. At that time Rivera started having affairs with women many years his senior. How these two subjects related in his mind are beyond me.

Though exenterated these stories are part of the legend Rivera built around himself. And it is true that, though he was an unattractive man with a frog-like face, he had considerable success with women throughout his life. Who needs looks when you have talent?

A large man of huge appetites, eating and drinking, he also indulged his craving for womanizing. In Spain he began living with Russian painter Angelina Beloff and had a son who died as a child. When Rivera left for Mexico he told Beloff he would send for her, but never did. Instead he moved to Paris and met another Russian, Marevna Vorobieva, who bore him a daughter. In addition to his womanizing ways he was also known for his volatile temper engaging in many fights with those who ridiculed his work when cubism came under attack. Unable to sell his art, he returned to Mexico, broke in 1921 their he met a special lady named Frida Kahlo.

Synesthesis is an ancient Greek term meaning “with sensation.” It is a neurologically based phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory leads to involuntary experiences in a second sensory. An example of this is when a person can hear blue or taste a square. It is this cross wiring in the brain that makes the sound of a trumpet look blue or the shape of a square taste sour for a synaesthete.

It is thought that as many as 1 in 23 people, more women then men, have some version of Synesthesis. Including the Russian born artist Wassily Kandinsky. In his case, colors and paint strokes created sounds or musical notes and vise versa. Kandinsky is credited with making some of the first truly abstract paintings, but the paintings were more than just visual creations. He wanted to evoke sound through sight and create the equivalent of a symphony that would stimulate not just the eyes but the ears as well.

There are other artists, poets, writers, and musicians who have been known or thought to have had Synesthesis. Van Gogh and Rockmoninoff just to list a couple.

Who else might have this condition and what greatness might they accomplish next?

Van Gogh’s famous oil painting, “The Harvest” was created in 1888. Inspired by an earlier drawing of the same name, this painting was finished in one sitting. Van Gogh was so pleased with his work that he gave it the French title “La Moisson”. It was quite rare giving his painting a title. Most of Van Gogh’s works were given titles by dealers, critics and art historians. “The Harvest” was also one of the first panoramas created by Van Gogh as he was unable to attempt such a view before. Why? Previously, living in Holland, he found the flat landscape to be uninspiring unlike this new agricultural French countryside with all its activities.