National Museum of Art

Housed in an elegant 19th century building with a grand style of architecture blending Italian-renaissance and French-classicism, the National Museum of Art showcases centuries of Mexico’s artistic heritage.

The gallery is centered around three permanent collections.

XX en el XXI offers a journey through the diverse styles and genres of 20th century Mexican art. The collection spans the era of the Mexican Revolution and the decades of national renewal that followed the fighting.

In the early to mid-20th century, Mexico was at the center of several groundbreaking artistic movements. The country is most famous as the home of the muralism movement, with several great muralist works included in the collection. This period also saw acclaim for the opposing forces of avant-garde Stridentism and the modernist Contemporáneos.

Ideal Territory: Perspectives on an Era highlights the natural beauty of Mexico, with a collection of epic landscape paintings centered around the work of José María Velasco. There are several of Velasco’s iconic paintings of the Valley of Mexico in the 19th century, depicting this stunning setting before it was overtaken by the sprawl of modern-day Mexico City. Other pieces depict the highlands, desert and coasts of this spectacular and varied land.

The Glyptotheque, an exhibition dedicated to sculpture, contains over 70 sculptures from Mexico’s top sculptors.

The museum also hosts a rotating calendar of temporary exhibitions. Some of these dive deeper into specific chapters of Mexico’s art history. Others showcase the work of great artists from other parts of the world, loaned from top international galleries. An up-to-date list of the current temporary exhibitions can be found on the museum’s website.

Mexico has made an enormous contribution to the global art scene over the centuries, with many of the nation’s most famous names included in this gallery.

There is an extensive collection from 19th century landscape painter José María Velasco. Born in the State of Mexico and residing most of his life in Mexico City, Velasco’s epic works reveal the natural beauty of the Valley of Mexico. Sweeping vistas of the valley beneath volcanoes reveal a time when the city spanned an area not much bigger than the Centro Histórico, when the surrounding mountains were not yet obscured by pollution.

In the early 20th century, the Mexican muralism movement took the art world by storm. Foremost amongst the muralists was Diego Rivera, whose works adorn many of Mexico City’s most famous public buildings.

Rivera’s murals are highly political. Paisage Zapatista (Zapatista landscape) introduces themes of the Mexican Revolution. Río Juchitán, an epic mural from the culmination of Rivera’s career, depicts an idyllic scene at a river in Oaxaca, incorporating themes around social class, indigenous communities, the female body and role of childhood.

Equally political is the work of David Alfaro Siqueiros whose paintings Accidente en la mina (Mining Accident) and Madre proletaria (Proletariat Mother) convey the hardships of working class life in 1930s Mexico.

José Clemente Orozco is another of Mexico’s best known muralists. His dark, intensely political and often violent images express social problems and shed light on Mexico’s history.

A number of works are on display from Orozco’s series titled Los teules, a Náhuatl language word used by the Aztecs to refer to the Spanish conquistadors. These dramatic paintings are focused on themes around the Spanish conquest and pre-Hispanic culture. Cabeza flechada (Head pierced with arrows) and El desmembrado (The Dismembered Man) depict indigenous people killed or fatally wounded in battle. Indias (Indians) is a stark image of indigenous women at different stages of life, perhaps alluding to the lifecycle.

Aside from the bold nationalist art produced by the muralists, other Mexican artists are known for their contributions to surrealism and avant-garde art forms. Chief amongst these is Rufino Tamayo, whose experimental figuration in portraits and still life had a great impact on abstract art in the mid-20th century. Another leader in this genre, Maria Izquierdo, introduced folk elements from nature and indigenous cultures in a fantastical approach that features elements of surrealism.