Posada, José Guadalupe [key], 1852–1913, Mexican artist. Of peasant stock, he became one of the greatest popular artists of the Americas and influenced the generation of Orozco and Rivera. An imagery of violence was characteristic of him, and he used distortion, caricature, and vigorous lines and contrasts. Working mainly in lithography, woodcuts and metalcuts, and relief etching, he produced thousands of prints that were sold cheaply to the masses; prints are often called Posadas after him. He attacked the Porfirio Díaz dictatorship and was sympathetic to the workers and peasants who became revolutionaries in 1910. Posada also illustrated popular ballads and festivals and did a series on the dance of death and on crimes and executions.
See study by F. Gamboa (1944).
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