The Slow Fuse of the Revolutionary Mural: Diego Rivera, Historical Revisionism and Poststructuralism

In this paper I will analyse the links between the revisionist historiography of the Mexican Revolution of 1910–20 and the revisionist literature on the Mexican murals produced in the period immediately afterwards, as well as the theoretical arguments that underpin both, before making a call for a “post-revisionist” reading of the art. I will then finish by making a post-revisionist iconographical analysis of Diego Rivera’s History of Mexico mural produced between 1929-35 as a counterpoint to revisionist ones that instead read it as government propaganda pure and simple