23 Facts About Tina Modotti

Tina Modotti left her native Italy in 1913 and emigrated to the United States, where she settled in San Francisco with her father and sister.

In San Francisco, Modotti worked as a seamstress, model, and theater performer and, later, moved to Los Angeles where she worked in film.

Tina Modotti was born Assunta Adelaide Luigia Tina Modotti Mondini in Udine, Friuli, Italy.

Tina Modotti's mother, Assunta, was a seamstress; her father, Giuseppe, was a mason.

Tina Modotti appeared in several plays, operas, and silent movies in the late 1910s and early 1920s, and worked as an artist's model.

In 1918, Tina Modotti began a romantic relationship with him and moved with him to Los Angeles to pursue a career in the motion picture industry.

Tina Modotti was listed as a US citizen in the 1920 Los Angeles township census.

Tina Modotti sustained a second loss with the death of her father, which forced her to return to San Francisco later in March 1922.

In 1923, Tina Modotti returned to Mexico City with Weston and his son Chandler, leaving behind Weston's wife Flora and their youngest three children.

Tina Modotti agreed to run Weston's studio free of charge in return for his mentoring her in photography.

Tina Modotti became the photographer of choice for the blossoming Mexican mural movement, documenting the works of Jose Clemente Orozco and Diego Rivera.

Between 1924 and 1928, Tina Modotti took hundreds of photographs of Rivera's murals at the Secretariat of Public Education in Mexico City.

In 1925, Tina Modotti joined International Red Aid, a Communist organization.

Tina Modotti began a relationship with Xavier Guerrero, who was a member of the Mexican Communist Party, in 1927.

Guerrero was sent to Moscow for a year to take part in political party training, and by 1928 Tina Modotti had met and begun a relationship with the exiled Cuban activist Julio Antonio Mella.

Tina Modotti was immediately arrested, but later released and cleared of his murder.

Tina Modotti first spent several months in Berlin, followed by several years in Moscow.

Tina Modotti apparently intended to make her way into Italy to join the anti-fascist resistance there.

Tina Modotti worked with Canadian Dr Norman Bethune during the disastrous retreat from Malaga in 1937.

In 1939, following the collapse of the Republican movement in Spain, Tina Modotti left Spain with Vidali and returned to Mexico under a pseudonym.

In 1942, at the age of 45, Tina Modotti died from heart failure while on her way home in a taxi from a dinner at Hannes Meyer's home in Mexico City, under what are viewed by some as suspicious circumstances.

Tina Modotti's grave is located within the vast Panteon de Dolores in Mexico City.

Tina Modotti was portrayed by Ashley Judd in the 2002 film Frida, about fellow artist Frida Kahlo.