Los Espectadores (The Spectators)

Mexican artist Rufino Tamayo merged cultural heritage and broad artistic influences for this painting. Created by mixing sand with paint, Los Espectadores alludes to the physicality of traditional adobe walls, an association underscored by the reddish, earthen hue. Tamayo’s use of vibrant color and his subject matter present his pride in Mexican culture. The three figures facing the viewer draw visual references from the biblical motif of the three kings and Pablo Picasso’s Three Musicians paintings. Tamayo depicts Los Espectadores in an artistic style that combines features of Cubist and Surrealist works from the European and American Modernist movements of the early 1900s with pre-Hispanic geometric art that existed before 1492.