A mural by well-known Mexican muralist Diego Rivera that went missing 50 years ago may still be in Mexico, and not in China, Argentine-Mexican art critic Raquel Tibol said Sunday.

Tibol said that even though an official of the Fine Arts Institute said the mural was in China, "it's not true, it's an invention."

The mural, named Pesadilla De Guerra, Sueno de Paz (Nightmare of War,Dream of Peace), depicts China's Mao Zedong and the former Soviet Union's Joseph Stalin offering the dove of peace to symbolic figures representing western states: France's Marianne, England's John Bull and the United States' Uncle Sam.

Tibol said Rivera had promised to sell the work to China for 5,000 U.S. dollars but there was no evidence that it had been sent to China.

In her book, titled Diego Rivera: Light and Shadows, Tibol reproduced Rivera's letter that explained to Czechoslovakia's World Peace Council why this 1952 work had not arrived. Its embarkation to Czechoslovakia was the last known time the work was seen.

She said at least one painting by Mexican painter Mario Orozco Rivera was confiscated by the government, because it criticized the jailing of muralist David Alfaro Siqueiros.

Source: Xinhua