20世纪上半叶，美国和墨西哥之间的文化交流频繁，艺术家和知识分子来回穿梭于两国的共同边界。对美国艺术家来说，墨西哥描绘社会和政治主题的不朽的公共壁画在艺术家们寻求与深受大萧条影响的公众建立联系的时候，提供了另一种美学。墨西哥的影响力越来越大，因为何塞·克莱门特·奥罗兹科、迭戈·里维拉和大卫·阿尔法罗·西奎罗斯等艺术家纷纷前往美国展出、销售他们的作品，与当地的艺术家并肩工作，制作大型壁画。当地的艺术家们经常充当他们的助手，并向他们传授壁画技术。《美国生活》研究了他们的作品对70多位艺术家的影响，包括马里恩·格林伍德、菲利普·古斯顿、野口勇、杰克逊·波洛克和查尔斯·怀特。它对艺术史提出了一种新的理解，这种理解承认了墨西哥壁画家在1925年至1945年间对美国艺术的风格、主题和意识形态产生的广泛而深刻的影响。

An in-depth look at the transformative influence of Mexican artists on their U.S. counterparts during a period of social change

The first half of the 20th century saw prolific cultural exchange between the United States and Mexico, as artists and intellectuals traversed the countries’ shared border in both directions. For U.S. artists, Mexico’s monumental public murals portraying social and political subject matter offered an alternative aesthetic at a time when artists were seeking to connect with a public deeply affected by the Great Depression. The Mexican influence grew as the artists José Clemente Orozco, Diego Rivera, and David Alfaro Siqueiros traveled to the United States to exhibit, sell their work, and make large-scale murals, working side-by-

side with local artists, who often served as their assistants, and teaching them the fresco technique. Vida Americana examines the impact of their work on more than 70 artists, including Marion Greenwood, Philip Guston, Isamu Noguchi, Jackson Pollock, and Charles White. It provides a new understanding of art history, one that acknowledges the wide-ranging and profound influence the Mexican muralists had on the style, subject matter, and ideology of art in the United States between 1925 and 1945.