Background
Her mother was Mercedes Valseca.
Her mother was Mercedes Valseca.
Carmen Mondragón was the fifth of eight children of General Manuel Mondragón, Secretario de Guerra y Marina in 1913 and inventor of the Mondragón rifle. Carmen Mondragón received a privileged education in Mexico, and afterwards from 1897 to 1905 in France, learning to speak French fluently. Afterwards they moved to San Sebastián, Spain, where Carmen"s brother Manuel ran a photo studio.
In San Sebastián, both started painting.
In 1921 both returned to Mexico, where they went separate ways. Whether they were ever divorced is unknown.
Carmen Mondragón turned towards the artists" scene of Mexico City, got contacts with José Vasconcelos and Xavier Villaurrutia, and was interested in the Teatro Ulises movement. She had multiple sexual affairs
Her beauty is described as mesmerizing and erotic, and she was apparently the first woman in Catholic Mexico who wore a miniskirt.
She became model of several notable painters and photographers, among others posing for some of Diego Rivera"s murals, for Tina Modotti, Antonio Garduño, Roberto Montenegro, Matías Santoyo, Edward Weston and in 1928 for Ignácio Rosas at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes. Carmen Mondragón had an intense love relationship with Gerald Murillo, also known as Doctor Atl, who named her "Nahui Olin", a symbol of Aztec renewal meaning "four movement", the symbol of earthquakes. They lived together in the former Louisiana Merced Cloister.
At this time she wrote her poems Óptica cerebral, poemas dinámicos (1922) and Calinement je suis dedans (1923), finished several naïve paintings, and composed.
As intensely as the love relationship began, it ended equally quickly in the mid-1920s. Later she denied it completely.
After having several further affairs, she stepped out of public life in the 1940s. As in Frida Kahlo"s life, interest in her life increased after her death.
Carmen Mondragón is considered one of the talented and revolutionary women who formed the 1920s and 1930s in Mexico by activism and creativity, like Guadalupe Marín, Antonieta Rivas Mercado, Frida Kahlo, Tina Modotti, Lupe Vélez and María Izquierdo.
Her popularity was due more to her beauty than to her artistic and literary work. She herself described her work as intuitive. All her self-portraits show oversized, green eyes, but her eyes seem highlighted also in paintings by other artists.