At this Venice Biennial, the Mexican pavilion was declared the most important in the competition and the Mexican painters were included among the six finalists selected by the jury. The art critic, Jorge Juan Crespo de la Serna, who was present at the event, commented that there was some bitterness relating to the final voting. From the outset of the discussions, the artists mentioned were all Mexicans—along with several other leading contenders that included Henri Matisse (1869-1954), Constant Permeke (1886-1952) and Max Beckman (1884-1950). These were our three painters, Diego Rivera (1886-1957), David Alfaro Siqueiros (1896-1974) and Rufino Tamayo (1899-1991). There were several rounds of voting. First prize ended up going to Matisse, while the second prize—in other words, the prize offered by the Museu de Arte Moderna of São Paulo, Brazil—was awarded to Siqueiros. Nobody called into question this award, which was such an honor for Mexico. What was also highly significant was the contrast between Matisse and Siqueiros. True, an award was granted to a French painter who had reached a stage that was frankly formalistic and almost essentially decorative. However, in awarding the second prize to Siqueiros, the Biennial was implicitly recognizing the merit and quality of another type of contemporary art, steeped as it was in concept and practice that was diametrically opposed to that of Matisse.
The French critic Raymond Cogniat referred to the Mexican art as the “greatest discovery of the Biennial. We feel that we are contemplating completely original work. This creative effort has developed outside the European influences and has asserted itself with such vehemence that it is impossible to resist.”
