Niña madre (Child Mother)

Siqueiros' lithograph Child Mother, produced more than 20 years after most works in this exhibition, underscores his artistic longevity (Orozco died in 1949; Rivera in 1957). More than the other two "grandes," Siqueiros was forced to address the long-term changes in the direction of the Revolution. Forty years after the start of the Revolution, and despite the growing political and economic strength of the state, the lower classes seemed farther than ever from the rewards promised them. Siqueiros' lithograph suggests the strife and poverty to which peasants were still subject. The violent backdrop which frames the young mother and her child threatens to overcome them, yet their determination is echoed in their ferocious gazes.