HIGHLY RECOMMENDED - Educational Media Reviews Online
Artistic Expression • Biographies • Latinx Studies • Politics and Policy • Spanish Language • Urban Studies • U.S. History • World HistoryDate of Completion: 2019 | Run Time: 60 min and 54:60 minutes | Language: English and Spanish with English subtitles (Spanish subtitles available) | Captions: Yes | Includes: Transcript & Study Guide | Directors: Lorena Manríquez & Miguel Picker | Producer: Lorena Manríquez
SIQUEIROS: Walls of Passion is an hour-long documentary that profiles Mexican visual artist David Alfaro Siqueiros (1896–1974) and the resurrection of his Los Angeles mural América Tropical, located at the birthplace of Los Angeles and later championed by the Chicano movement as a symbol of its oppressed culture. One of the great Mexican artists of the 20th century and one of the three great Mexican muralists along with Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco, Siqueiros was a controversy-stirring revolutionary and activist who lived with theatrical flair and painted on an epic scale. As one of the primary advocates of modern public art, Siqueiros painted murals in Mexico, the U.S., Cuba, Chile, and Argentina.
Educational Media Reviews Online | Johnnie N. Gray, Technology Services Librarian, Christopher Newport University
Highly Recommended. "More political than Rivera and his other contemporaries, Siqueiros' influence on the art world is more than most people realize. Suitable for any student of art in high school or at the college level."
AWARDS
Best Director for Doc Feature | Queens World Film Festival
Nominee, Best Cinematography for Doc Feature | Queens World Film Festival
Best Social Issue Documentary | Latino and Native American Film Festival
FESTIVALS
Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival
Boston Latino International Film Festival
OC Fiesta Film Festival
San Diego Latino Film Festival
Queens World Film Festival
American Documentary and Animation Film Festival
Festival de Cine Todos Santos
Philadelphia Latino Film Festival
Latino and Native American Film Festival
International Festival of Film Art
SCREENINGS
Orange County Museum of Art
UCLA Center of Southern Cone Studies
Lorena Manríquez is an award-winning independent filmmaker based in Los Angeles. She is the recipient of a number of film industry fellowships, including the NALIP Producers Academy, the CPB/PBS Producers Academy, the IFP Rough Cut Lab with her film, Ulises’ Odyssey (2014), and a Firelight Media Documentary Lab alum. Lorena’s film SIQUEIROS: WALLS OF PASSION (2019) was awarded two California Documentary Project grants by Cal Humanities, and received funding from ITVS Diversity Development Fund, ITVS Open Call, Latino Public Broadcasting, and Firelight Media’s Next Step Fund.
SIQUEIROS: WALLS OF PASSION was broadcast on PBS on the WORLD Channel in 2020, screened at film festivals worldwide, and received the 2020 Queens World Film Festival Best Director Award in a Documentary Feature and the 2021 Social Impact Award during the Latino & Native American Film Festival. Lorena has directed and produced two short documentaries for Field of Vision: Hopewell (2016), featured in The New Yorker magazine website, and Here I’ll Stay (2017) for the ‘Our 100 Days’ documentary series in partnership with Firelight Media. Lorena is a member of NALIP, the IDA, Film Fatales, and Cinemáticas.