The affect of the Mexican Revolution Essay Example for Free

The affect of the Mexican Revolution Essay Francisco Bollain y Goitia Garcia (1882-1960) is a prominent Mexican artists of the XX century, who has been almost forgotten for decades and is now rediscovered. His works are rather complicated for perception and they can hardly be called pleasant, for Goitia concentrated on the most homely aspects of the world around him, demonstrating the fatality of revolution and violent changes in the most shocking way. This paper is to investigate two of his famous paintings – Zacatecas Landscape with Hanged Men I and Zacatecas Landscape with Hanged Men II. The paper is to demonstrate the style and manner of painting, as well as compare those pictures with works of other Mexican painters of the time such as Jose Clemente Orozco and Victor Augustin Cassasola. Some biographical data about Goitia is necessary to understand his works, so the paper shall open with a short biographic reference about the artist. Francisco Goitia was born in the Mexican state of Zacatecas. Being a talented artist since his early years he studied in the Academy of San Carlos in Mexico City and than in Barcelona with the Spanish artist Francisco Gali. Upon return to his home country in 1912 he has found it being wasted by the revolution. Having occupied the position of official painter for General Angel of Pancho Villas army he had an ability to observe war and it’s consequences with his own eyes. The experience influenced Goitia’s works greatly and his paintings are now examples of uncovered brutality and dread. There were even claims that Goitia ordered to exhume executed soldiers and hang them on cactuses as models for his pictures so it is hard to say how much in his paintings comes from real facts and how much from artificial staging of his morbid fantasies. Goitia has never worked with monumental forms so characteristic for Mexican art of the time. His canvases remained inside realism, impressionism and to a great extent symbolism, so he never became so popular as Diego Rivera or Jose Orozco. His last years passed in self-imposed poverty, but still he was quite a famous painter inside Mexico since early 20-s. In recent years his works became of interest for scholars outside Mexico as well. Both landscapes of Zacatecas (I and II) were painted most probably in 1914, although the exact date is unknown. They are both variations about the same topic: a bleak depressive landscape with half-dissolved corpses of hanged men on the trees. Both pictures were drawn from nature. Goitia knew this terrain well since he himself was born in Zacatecas, so he takes almost an intimate and affected position towards the scene. The landscape is typical for northern Mexico – it includes grey and yellow desert land with hills on the horizon and yuccas growing everywhere. The men hanged on the trees seem to their parts – so â€Å"naturally† they are tied to the branches. Most of the researchers point biblical analogies in the first painting for the landscape is so bleak that it reminds Golgotha. The analogy becomes even stronger for Goitia called his series of paintings about revolution â€Å"martyrdoms†. Goitia has been in the army of Pancho Villa in 1914 when he has captured the capital city of Zacatecas. Being both fascinated and frightened by that what he has seen he started feeling that his mission was to record the epic events of the revolution for history. As he himself put it â€Å"I went everywhere with the army, observing. I did not carry any weapons because I knew that the mission of killing was not mine† . Among the things Goitia has witnessed was death of general Lazaro Gomez, who has been repulsing enemy attacks auntill he ran out of ammunition and shot to his back after being taken prisoner. The body of the general has been beheaded and hanged on a tree with his head replaced with the head of a steer. It is believed that exactly death of Gomez inspired Goitia to paint his Zacatecas Landscape with Hanged Men I, although he used bodies of simple soldiers as â€Å"models†. So the first variant of the painting can really be considered a record of actual events, although Goitia did not concentrate on the death of a particular man, but aimed to show the series of deaths in Zacatecas. The most obvious difference between two variants of paintings is the manner in which they are drawn and involvement of the spectator. Zacatecas I still looks like a â€Å"real† classical painting with obvious elements attributable to artistic form including shape, symmetry, movement and rhythm. The background plays an active role in the picture and the bodies of the hanged look simply like the bodies of the hanged. They are horrible and shocking, but at least â€Å"natural†. Perhaps Goitia was not satisfied with the artistic effect of the first painting, so in the second variant he made it more impressive and less realistic . This was necessary to strike the audience in the necessary way. In the second painting two dead bodies are absolute centre of the compositions, and their empty eyeholes are pointed directly ad the spectator, as if they were looking at him. The position of the bodies creates an impression of surrealistic â€Å"gates† to the dreadful reality of death and grief. Death and it’s triumph are key points of the picture. The first variant is painted with oil on canvas and the second one looks more like a touchy pencil drawing, which has later been colored. To make his second painting even more symbolic Goitia replaced usual terrain of Zacatecas with surrealistic vision of deadly symbolism. In Zacatecas Landscape with Hanged Men II the trees seem to come out from gothic descriptions of Poe as they are gnarled and lifeless being painted with pale cold colors. Skulls of animals on the ground once more stress that death is a true master of the stage. The only living creatures on the second painting are owls – traditional symbols of night and forerunners of death. They create a ghostly atmosphere of the scene. Bodies are waved to different sides paralleling the braches they hang on, so they seem to be blown by different winds. White sun in the grey skies creates an image of omen. The general impression from the first picture is that Goitia painted that what he has seen and the second picture is undoubtedly a manifesto of his views, in which he tried to impress the observers by shocking view of horrifying images. As it has been already mentioned, the paintings belong to Goitia’s revolutionary period when he worked as a painter of Mexican federal army. The revolution in Mexico lasted from 1910 till 1917. Some scholars believe that Cristero rebellion of 1926-1929 was also a part of the revolution, so revolutionary events lasted in Mexico for almost two decades. Goitia’s paintings are images of that what virtually every Mexican of the time has once experienced, and this is perhaps the main reason why Goitia is so popular in Mexico and less famous outside its borders. It is hard to say for sure whether Goitia was an active supporter of the revolution or just followed the army as a chronicler. His later memoirs seem to support the second point of view – Goitia remained an artist but not a revolutionary throughout his travels after the army. The manner of paintings and their impression also correspond to the version. He has never painted any picture in which he would admire revolution, but both paintings seem rather to blame its barbarity. The manner of Goitia’s painting reminds the most famous apocalyptic pictures such as Triumph of Death by Peter Breugel, descriptions of war by Goya or Picasso’s Guernica. Most of the revolutionary painters glorify its triumphs and view it as a way to the new world. Goitia has chosen to demonstrate the horrifying â€Å"side effects† of progressive social upheavals. This was enough for him to be considered one of the sharpest critics of revolution in art. He explained that: â€Å"You see that it is natural that circumstances have made my temperament more inclined to the profound. There is a great deal of sadness in this country and I have tried to sum a certain phase of it† . Such Goitia’s insights are rather unusual for Mexico of the time, where revolution became almost a national idea, reflected in numerous artworks. This includes frescos by Diego Rivera or monumental modernist paintings of Jose Clemente Orozco. Mexican artists of the time shared different views of the revolution but there was one common thing for all of them – for them revolution was a magnificent event, a high tide of spirit and will, but in no way a vision of death and destruction. For example Diego Rivera was an incandescent Trotskyist, absolutizing the idea of global revolution and idealizing Trotsky as its dramatic leader. Orozco is a more complicated case for he was interested more in changes that revolution would cause in human minds and in the society. Still his art stands closer to the supporters of revolution as he used expressive modernist techniques being a revolutionary artist by his mere nature. And another common point of Rivera and Orozco is that they both are working with â€Å"objective reality† using artistic means to make the spectator impressed by this reality . In contrast, Goitia’s paintings are full of his own attitudes and they allow the spectator to make his. Revolutionary artists provided only one view, Goitia allowed the audience to chose. Although it is hard to find a â€Å"colleague† for Goitia between painters, such â€Å"colleague† still existed among photographers. Augustin Casasola in fact worked for the newspapers, but he would remain a usual reporter in case his pictures were not full of artistic sense, making them close to Goitia’s graphic works. As the revolution spread along Mexico Casasola established his own agency to provide home and foreign press with photographs of the event. Working as an independent photographer he was able to use his talent in full. he concentrated on all aspects of the revolution showing both victories and, like Goitia, the unattractive sides. He has also gathered a large collection of images of revolutionary individuals – from officers to peasants in their surroundings. Like Goitia his manner has been characterized by psychological dramatics and involvement of the spectator to the picture . Warlike and revolutionary art is always popular because there are always lots of people who are ready to admire the triumph of spirit and epic deeds. Less popular is art that shows the another side of war and revolution – death and destruction. To show this side the painter needs to be much more talented and avoid being just a thrilling entertainment. For this reason only a few painters became great after painting atrocities of war. Goitia is perhaps not so famous as Goya, but his works are deeply original.For this reason he is now being rediscovered and investigated by art historians worldwide. Works Cited: 1. Dore Ashton. (1999) Mexican Art of the Twentieth Century. In The 20th Century Art Book. ed. by Editors of Phaidon Press 2. Jacqueline Barnitz (2001) Twentieth-Century Art of Latin America University of Texas Press 3. Latin American Painting available at: http://www. chicagomanualofstyle. org/tools_citationguide. html (last accessed: November 19, 2007) 4. Viva Casasola! http://emiliobrizzi. blogspot. com/2007/03/viva-casasola. html (last accessed: November 19, 2007)

Romantic Relationships During High School Essay -- Argumentative Essay

Are relationships in high school truly worth the potential heartache? Answers to this question vary, ranging from the enthusiastic â€Å"yes!† to the skeptical view of which cutting off one’s own third toe makes more sense to indifference. Yet, how can the value of a relationship be determined when the tumult of everyday teenage life may result in the potential loss or gain of a new relationship every week? One view may be relationships teenagers enter into are valuable practice for later in life, teaching those which engage in them how to interact with members of the opposite sex in a way which leads to marriage or family. Others, however, state the truism being a significantly low percentage of high school romances result in marriage. Although some may say the benefits outweigh the risks, relationships in high school are not feasible for many and may not be worth the effort put into them. On average, of all high school romances, only an estimated eight to 11 pe rcent result in matrimony (WikiAnswers 1). To me, this renders those useless relationships, the other eighty-nine to ninety-two percent, just passing time. From these statistics, it would appear romance in high school is not only stressful, but also relatively useless. Rather than devoting large amounts of time to one person, high school students should be out with a group of friends, having fun and doing whatever it is teens do. This brings up another concern for high school relationships: time. The time some students put into a relationship can become absurd. In this way, we come across the student who never seems to have their work done or never has time to work on their work. This free time would normally be used to do important tasks for school, but rather is us... ...lly prepared for such life experiences. Though not always negative, high school relationships are also not likely to have a drastically positive impact on students either. Levels of stress in life can be at their peak during years of development, though it may seem daunting, not all are incapable of balancing a relationship and life. Nevertheless, having a relationship, the stress to succeed in within the relationship, and the stress to not become the main topic of gossip for their peers in what should have been a private matter may magnify the pressures of everyday life. Works Cited U.S. Department of Health & Human Services. â€Å"Pathways to Adulthood and Marriage: Teenagers’ Attitudes, Expectations, and Relationship Patterns† Aspe.hhs.gov Web. 17 Nov. 2010. WikiAnswers. â€Å"What are the statistics on high school relationships?† Answers.com Web. 30 Nov. 2010.

Decision Making and Reasoning Essay

There are different types of decisions that we must make as well. From simple choices when planning for a vacation or making more life changing choices that require a detailed, logical analysis concerning what to do. Questions about strategy use have been treated in several different lines of decision-making. Largely, a distinction arises in terms of when and why deliberative processing best describes decision-making behavior. Under novel decision-making conditions, there is no prior experience to guide the decision-making process. The process involves selecting the appropriate strategy. Under repetitive successful decision-making conditions, there is a long history of experience. Some decisions become automatic in the sense that they require no deliberation. In this process, we address the issue of how decision processes transit from more controlled or deliberative strategies, to simple decision rules, and finally to automatic or routine strategies. What one sees as rational behavior in many of the social situations that have been studied is likely to depend on whether one conceives of rationality as enlightened self-interest in a fairly narrow sense, or one factors in the roles of such variables as self-image and conscience, or one allows for the possibility that a rational person might take a genuine interest in the welfare of other people, independently of his or her own. In other words, what is perceived as a dilemma from one perspective may not be a dilemma as perceived from another; a decision problem that is very difficult when assessed relative to one set of values may be very easy when assessed relative to another set. Dilemmas are difficult decision problems, necessitating, as they often do, choices between equally unsatisfactory (or in some cases equally attractive) options. Some social dilemmas pit self-interest against the common good. What constitutes rational behavior in dealing with dilemmas has been a question of interest to many theorists and students of human reasoning. Certain prototypical situations—notably various versions of the prisoner’s dilemma have been intensively studied with the hope of gaining insights into the determinants of competitive and cooperative behavior. However, along the way, we may use simple rules to decide when and where to stop and which specific routes to take, depending on incidental factors such as traffic. It is important to understand how these various decision domains are differently perceived and processed. (Betsch et al, 2004, p1) Strategies That Guide Human Decision Making A strategy is used to refer to processes which are relatively slow, goal-directed, systematic, and under explicit conscious control. However, it is also argued that to reason deductively rather than inductively does require a conscious effort at deduction and only occurs in response to specific instructions. Thus deduction is seen as a strategy. An account of strategic deductive reasoning with the mental models framework is preferred. (D’Ydewalle et al, 2000, p1) The strategic phases of decision making are the generation phase, the evaluation phase, and the learning phase. In a very rough sense, these phases correspond to the periods before, during, and after one makes a decision, respectively. Hence, they can be viewed as three successive points in time, but there is a great deal of recursion that can occur between phases. (Klein et al, 2001, p31) The tendency to implement appropriate behaviors strategies is apparent by the number of techniques available. For example, vigilant problem solving found that most executives report that they engage in one of a number of simplistic strategies for arriving at a solution. These simplistic strategies of simple decision rules are grouped them into cognitive categories. The cognitive decision rules: 1. Unreflectively using a standard operating procedure, 2. Accepting the first alternative that comes to mind that is good enough to meet the minimal requirements (satisfying), 3. Searching ones mind for a well-known analogy that turns out to be inappropriate (analogizing), 4. Consolidating the choice discovered through rules (1) to (3) and bolstering it in one’s mind by focusing mainly on the positive features of the choice, 5. Saving time and effort by getting someone who has looked into the issues to provide a brief description of what one should do and why (the nutshell briefing rule). (Byrnes, 1998, p21) For example in a case study format, Suppose that a student already possesses some automatic but dysfunctional strategies for making the decisions the instructor seeks to have make well. Then, before the training effort can begin in earnest, those â€Å"bad habits† have to be eliminated. This will be a prodigious task because, by their nature, the already established strategies will initiate themselves effortlessly, uncontrollably, and beyond the trainee’s consciousness. Because decision making is such a fundamental human activity, which each of us has practiced day-in and day-out all our lives, perhaps the majority of our decision strategies are automated. This means that it is folly to think that it is even possible to fundamentally change a person’s basic decision-making dispositions. (Klein et al, 2001, p25) Managerial leadership is generally considered a major factor in organizational behavior because of its putative effect on individuals, groups, and organizational outcomes. Some regard leadership as a special case of social influence. But progress has been very slow in understanding why leaders exert influence in certain situations while not in others. Research has not produced particularly robust and reliable findings in this regard.

Peer Pressuring Parents High School Being On The Honor Roll

Peer Pressuring Parents During high school being on the honor roll was a huge deal to me. I loved the feeling of making my parents proud. During my junior year at Saint Clair High School I took AP biology for a semester. Even though I didn t want to take it, my parents pushed it on me. Even the counselor forced it on me. I felt like if I didn’t take it, my parents would be disappointed in me. That was something I would not let happen. With all the pressure I finally gave in. It was a hot day in the beginning of September. I remember nervously walking into Ap biology, on the 1st day of school. As I entered the class I immediately heard an obnoxious parrot. The birdcage was on the other side of the class room underneath the Michigan State†¦show more content†¦He slowly got out of the truck and worked his way to the passenger door. He just stood there. I quickly noticed tears rolling down his cheeks. He opened the passenger door and mumbled â€Å"I’m so sorry you had to come home to this.† I quickly said â€Å"What are you talking about?† He motioned for me to come towards him. I finally realized what happened. There... in the passenger seat was my dog Toto wrapped in his favorite blue blanket. Tears began to flow down my cheeks. Toto was gone. Today was officially the worse friday the 13th. Not only did I get a bad grade on my quiz, my dog died. Later on during October I started falling behind. Every day we had at least 2 hours of homework, and not including the reading. Everything sounded similar. The vocabulary words sounded alike and even had similar definitions. At this point I was so stressed out. I started to give up. Sadly I didn t care about my grade in that class. Every day felt the same at that point. I started to dread going to class. I was sick of walking into a class where I was clueless. I hated hearing the bird everyday especially during test and exams. I even hated my teacher which made the class 10 times harder. He would yell at students for every little thing. One day a girl came to class in her swim wear. She was on the swim team and her coach said she had to keep it on. Well Mr. Underwood started screaming at her in front of the class. He was so angry that his face wasShow MoreRelatedThe Pressures Faced by College Students886 Words   |  4 PagesIn college campuses across the USA, college students are f acing an abundance of pressure. They juggle family stress to, college stress, to peer stress, students are constantly pulled into a never ending cycle of stress. Constantly pursuing their education to do whatever is necessary for them to graduate from college. Today’s generation of teenagers/young adults, and older generation of people, face alike challenges that are dramatically different from the before. Today we have an abundance of sophisticatedRead MoreAmerican vs Asian Education Systems Essay1930 Words   |  8 Pages There are many factors that influence the Asian and Asian immigrants’ high levels of academic achievements. The environment that students experienced in Asia is totally different from the foreigners’ like the schoolings, the testing and grading testing system. Non-Asian people observed many high levels academic achievements of Asian and they start making false assumptions. The education system in Asia is different from Americ a’s which explains the stereotype that common Asians areRead MoreMarketing Mistakes and Successes175322 Words   |  702 Pagesback in 1976, was 147 pages and included such long-forgotten cases as Korvette, W. T. Grant, Edsel, Corfam, Gilbert, and the Midi. In this eleventh edition, seven cases from the tenth edition have been dropped, and seven added, several of these being modified from earlier editions. Other cases have been updated, and in some instances reclassified. Two exciting new entrepreneurial cases, Google and Starbucks, are introduced, and the entire Entrepreneurial Adventures moved to the front of the bookRead MoreProject Mgmt296381 Words   |  1186 PagesUniversity of Oregon. He is certified Scrum Master. v â€Å"Man’s mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.† Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. To my family who have always encircled me with love and encouragement—my parents (Samuel and Charlotte), my wife (Mary), my sons and their wives (Kevin and Dawn, Robert and Sally) and their children (Ryan, Carly, Connor and Lauren). C.F.G. â€Å"We must not cease from exploration and the end of all exploring will be to arrive where