One thing this trip gave me was a fuller understanding and appreciation for the Mexican artist Orozco. I had some familiarity with him. I had seen his mesmerizing mural work in the Hospicio Cabanas on a previous visit and had discovered a small work of his in the collection of Chicago's Art Institute.
I was somewhat disappointed that the galleries surrounding the courtyards of the Cabanas I had spent time exploring on my previous visit were closed, perhaps because Tuesday is a free day at the museum. As I was leaving I spotted a doorway to an open gallery and entered. What I discovered was a sizable exhibition of Orozco's sketches and studies for his murals, including several studies for the murals at the Cabanas. It is always interesting to me to see a single artist's work grouped together. It gives me a deeper and clearer understanding of their overall vision and creative process.
He was an excellent draftsman, many of his mural studies were sketched over grids and perspective lines. He experimented with how best to locate and create his frescos, a time consuming and laborious process. In his work he was able to suggest raw emotion and muscular power with a great economy of strokes.
For the first time I was able to see his mural at the University Art Museum. 2 young, quite adorable college kids greeted me at the entrance desk. One, small, cute, the 3 top buttons of his shirt undone to display 5 of what were probably a total of 15 chest hairs, addressed me in Spanish. I guess he saw something in my face because he said "oh" and switched to English, explaining to me I would have to remove my, ubiquitous on this trip to save the skin on my balding head, baseball cap and check my messenger bag. I dutifully handed them over to his companion behind the desk, a muscular student in skin tight white pants and an equally tight tee shirt which emphasized his impressive chest and biceps. Both of them were obviously keenly aware of the image they were presenting.
The mural was overwhelming and left me stunned. It is an explosion of anger, difficult to look at yet impossible to turn away from. Were I to see a speaker in the lecture hall where it is located I would probably have no recollection of what they said because the image is so consuming and powerful.
I went through the other galleries in the small museum. One contained works and objects dating back to the 15th century. Others held works by contemporary artists.
I returned to the mural one last time before I left. The cute student at the reception desk spoke with me of how powerful the work was as the second seemed to consciously make his muscles ripple inside his tight clothing as he retrieved my bag.
As I was walking down an avenue back to my hotel I passed two structures on either side of the boulevard. One had been a convent, partially demolished in the late 1800/s to lengthen the street. On the other side, in a lovely parklike setting with a fountain in it's center, was a church some regard as the most beautiful in the city, in a city full of beautiful churches. As I briefly stepped inside a single bird was fluttering around it's dome.
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