Synopses & Reviews
House on the Bridge...Ten Turbulent Years with Diego Rivera is the story of Diego Rivera's first wife, Angeline Beloff, a painter and engraver from pre-revolutionary St. Petersburg, and her relationship with the well known muralist in Belle Epoque Paris.
These were the years when he was developing his skills in Europe before returning to Mexico to depict his country's history in murals. They lived and struggled with other artists-Pablo Picasso, Amadeo Modigliani, Maria Blanchard, Apollinaire-- and others in Montparnasse before, during and after WWI.
They met in the medieval town of Bruges, traveled to London, visited museums, made trips to Spain and eventually married in Dieppe in 1911. He was in Mexico City at the beginning of the Mexican Revolution and claimed to have smuggled explosives in his paint box to assassinate Diaz, while she was in St. Petersburg during Bloody Sunday and the unrest leading up to the Russian Revolution.
During their years in Paris, they watched their world change from Belle Epoque to the horrors of world war where they were forced to sleep in subways by night and stand in long lines searching for coal to keep warm in winter. Many times they ate at canteens set up specifically to feed artists.
Living with him was painful and exciting and their circle of friends was talented, mad and eventually successful. She loved him unconditionally during their life in Paris and probably for the rest of her life.
Synopsis
House on the Bridge: Ten Turbulent Years with Diego Rivera is the story of Diego Rivera's first wife, Angeline Beloff, an artist from pre-revolutionary Russia and her relationship with him in Belle Epoque Paris.