It was our first time to visit Guadalajara. We headed to Cabañas Cultural Center, a former orphanage that is now a museum.
Out front we checked out Plaza Tapatía with bronze sculptures The Founders. Pete sat on one of the thrones.
Inside the Cabañas building are José Clemente Orozco murals. In the central dome is Man of Fire with images of the three founders of Mexican Muralism: Diego Rivera, David Siqueiros and Orozco (himself aflame in the center).
Orozco painted the political Cabañas murals in 1935. This mural shows a priest with a native at his feet and an angel at his side who is unfurling the banner with the alphabet. Along with Catholicism, the Spanish language was also forced upon the local people.
In this mural the Spanish conquistador on the left leads to a new Mestizo race being created. Orozco painted 53 murals here, which became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997.
Here's a photo of Orozco, with his characteristic glasses and moustache.
In the kids gallery Kristina couldn't resist squatting down to don them herself.
We visited Museo de los Artes Universidad de Guadalajara to see additional Orozco murals. This photo is from The People and Its Leaders.
At the Governor's Palace there was an impressive Orozo mural in the stairway featuring Miguel Hidalgo, a Mexican priest and a leader of the Mexican War of Independence.
Orozco warned of the dual threats of fascism and communism.
It is said that Orozco thought this Hidalgo was one of his best murals. We have a much better appreciation for Orozco murals after visiting Guadalajara.
In Plaza de Armas we saw a Hidalgo statue. In 1810 Miguel Hidalgo led a revolt of the peasants against Spain that started on September 16th. This date is now celebrated as Mexican Independence Day.
Nearby we saw this Trump and confederate flag mural entitled Devolution and were struck by the powerful image of the shrunken brained White Supremacist-in-Chief. We invite you to read Ta-Nehisi Coates article The First White President.
Not all the street art we saw in Guadalajara was political. There were whimsical murals.
And colorful, angular murals.
Here the bougainvillea grows like trees.
One day we had birria de chivo, goat stew for lunch. Pete is in front of the popular restaurant.
For dessert we had jericallas, which is similar to flan.
A perfect complement was cafe olla made with coffee and cinnamon.
Guadalajara is a very vibrant city and we really enjoyed exploring it.
These are agave plants that are used for making tequila. They are called agave pineapples when they have been harvested and the lower leaves removed.
Agave is an important part of the culture throughout the state of Jalisco. We liked seeing an agave pineapple fountain.
This is part of the Bird Fountain.
Behind this fountain is the Guadalajara Cathedral.
The cathedral was dedicated in 1618.
This statue is of Luis Barragán, a Pritzker prize winning architect from Guadalajara. His ashes are in a niche in the rotunda behind him, which also includes other illustrious people from Jalisco.
Nearby we saw an exhibit of José Hernández-Claire’s photos, so we're including this one taken in the same park entitled Illustrious Men.
Walking is the best way to get to know a city, so we walked to the Vallarta Arches around dusk.
The old buildings were often beautifully lit at night, like the Octavio Paz Library.
The Governor’s Palace was lit like the Mexican flag, perhaps in anticipation of Mexican Independence Day.
This is the Degollado Theater.
We went for lunch at Restaurant Alium, which features a farm-to-table menu. We talked with the cook in this photo and learned all sorts of interesting things about Alium's food.
She explained how they smoked the peaches overnight for this salad.
Kristina is about to enjoy duck prosciutto on flatbread. The prosciutto was made in house and it takes a year for it to completely cure.
The beet salad was delightful, with a mix of beet puree, sliced beets, and topped with greens.
The smoked duck breast and figs served over polenta was also a winning dish.
While in Guadalajara we saw some interesting contemporary art too, including Jose Dávila’s three-dimensional Homage to the Square.
This is Social Agents by David Birks that was made of carved stacked cardboard.
Cricket by Carlos Rodel was such a simple metal shape but its form was immediately recognizable.
His Mater Naturae matinal was so colorful.
Walking around the center of Guadalajara we noticed bird graffiti art that we liked.
We left Guadalajara and flew to Mexico City (CDMX). We were excited to meet and travel with Pete’s cousins Diana and Alex. (You might remember we went camping with Diana, Alex and their kids this summer.)
We noticed the same bird grafitti are we had seen in Guadalajara.
The four of us took Uber everywhere in CDMX. This is the Soumaya museum that was designed by Mexican architect Fernando Romero.
We couldn't get the whole building and us in the selfie, but it was fun to try!
We went for dinner at La Casa de Tacos in Coyoacan, the neighborhood where we were staying.
Alex was bold in his food choices and ordered chapulines, grasshoppers, on his taco.
Here are the restaurant’s seasonal specials, complete with grasshopper drawings. (We didn’t try the chiles in nogada until the next day.)
This restaurant served only breakfast foods and, at this time of year, chiles in nogada. Each couple ordered one to share.
It's a delicious dish made of creamy walnut sauce covering a poblano chili stuffed with ground beef and pork. Chilies in nogada is traditional this time of year for two reasons: all the ingredients are in season, and it has the colors of the Mexican flag.
In anticipation of Mexican Independence Day (September 16th) we saw lots of decorations for sale.
This is dona en nogada, complete with chopped chilies, pomegranate and nogada sauce. It's only made seasonally to celebrate Mexican independence. Truthfully the chiles in nogada tasted much better.
Diana and Alex wanted to try churros con chocolate, so we went to El Moro, a churrería that has been in business since 1950.
It was fun to watch them fry the churros, but we were glad we had only eaten two each after seeing all that hot oil.
Like we did in Puebla, we took a food tour with Eat Mexico. We went to Merced market and it was fantastic! In fact it was Diana, Alex and Pete's favorite thing we did in CDMX. Here our guide Ubish was showing us fresh poblano chilies, the kind used to make chilies en nogada. When dried they are known as ancho chilies. We really lucked out because Ubish is also a chef and he answered all our cooking questions too.
We tried so many different types of tacos.
Here tripe, shoulder and chorizo are cooked on a round grill called a chorizera. The tortillas are fried in the center and all three meats are combined to make campachenos tacos. These were Alex's favorite tacos.
Ubish was friendly with all the market vendors, and we saw a different side of the market through their interactions and we felt immersed in authentic Mexican culture. Here Ubish is cutting a deep fried tamale with pork and a spicy green salsa. Pete was delighted by how different a tamales was once it had been fried and had a thick, crispy crust.
These are squash blossoms.
This is huitlacoche, which we saw translated on a menu as corn smut. An airborne fungus enters the ear of corn during pollination and it takes over the kernels.
We tried huitlacoche, squash blossoms and button mushrooms sautéed on a large tortilla called a huarache because it's made in the shape of the sole of a sandal. With salsa it was tasty.
Here are the happy eaters.
Next stop was the butchers in Merced market.
Pete is about to bite into a beef tongue taco. It was so tender and delicious.
Our brave cousins and we tasted a variety of insects. Ubish told us these were gusandos, fried maggots. Kristina suggested he call them fried caterpillars in the future. They actually tasted quite good, as did the chicatana, flying ants.
We opted not to try the chicken intestines (top) but the tiny fish that had been cooked in corn husks (middle) were really yummy.
Mezcal tastings and toasts were a fun way to end our tour.
We hiked up to Chapultepec Castle. Chapultepec means grasshopper hill.
Inside the castle were David Siqueiros murals that had so much movement and texture that they became Diana's favorite murals.
The murals were started in 1957, but Sequeiros was imprisoned for criticizing the Mexican President, and they weren't completed until 1971.
The ceiling in Chapultepec Castle was covered with Gabriel Flores' 1970 mural that depicts Juan Escutia leaping from the castle walls to his death, wrapped in the Mexican flag in order to prevent the flag from falling into US enemy hands. Known as the Children Heroes, Alex liked the painter's bold, modern lines and felt the strong emotions and story line came through.
This 19th century statue proves that big beards have been around for a long time. You might have noticed that Alex has an awesome beard. Happiness is ….. stroking your beard!
CDMX is such an awesome place and we walked a lot. This day according to Diana's FitBit we walked 20k steps.
With all that walking it was time for more tacos! Diana and Alex have tacos arabe topped with avocado, yum.
We went out for a special lunch at Maximo Bistro and enjoyed the masterful creations of executive chef Eduardo García. Pete had Manila clams and chanterelles for his appetizer.
We went out for a special lunch at Maximo Bistro and enjoyed the masterful creations of executive chef Eduardo García. Pete had Manila clams and chanterelles for his appetizer.
Diana apparently had a tower of salad.
But her favorite dish of the whole trip was this pork belly.
For dessert we shared fig and pistachio mil hojas, which was fantastic.
We had a great time exploring the Department of Education building's murals.
Pete saw his first David Siqueiros mural and found his art to be bold, abstract and contemporary. This is Patrios y Patricidas that was completed in 1971.
We had come to see the Diego Rivera murals painted in the 1930s. This one is about celebrating the corn harvest.
This mural shows the May pole dance.
We also went to Casa Azul, the Frida Kahlo museum again. Here Diana saw her favorite art of the trip, noting that Frida painted with strong emotion and suffered pain, but her viva la vida attitude was inspiring.
This trip Pete learned more from Frida's clothing exhibit, including how she used costuming to craft her persona in a way that was integral with her art. She adopted the traditional Zapotec dress from this matrilineal culture to give her power and show her pride in Mexico. Frida used her street car accident in a positive way, such as this 1941 photo where she displays her chest brace that was adorned with the communist hammer and sickle.
We visited Diego Rivera's Anahuacalli museum. Pete and the museum were both celebrating being 50 years old.
The museum was designed in the shape of a pyramid and uses volcanic stones as the building material.
Inside it was dark, but immediately we were impressed with this altar-like display of many beautiful pre-hispanic artworks.
The museum showcases Rivera's enormous collection of pre-Columbian art. This photo shows how much he loved these fascinating pieces.
The museum includes very little signage, leaving us to enjoy our emotional responses to the artwork.
Unfortunately Diego Rivera died before the museum was finished. But he did see the first floor completed.
When we looked up, we saw ceilings covered in mosaics with pre-Columbian themes like snakes and jaguars.
And Rivera included a number of hammer and sickle mosaics, here with the dove of peace. Both he and Frida were lifelong members of the communist party.
Alex and Diana had to fly home, so we spent another couple days enjoying CDMX. We visited the
Dolores Olmedo Museum to see more Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera art.
Olmedo was a close friend of Rivera's, and she collected many of their paintings. This is Frida’s Louis Burbank painting, where Burbank's corpse is shown to nourish his roots and body, in the cycle of life.
Rivera painted this portrait of Olmedo in 1955. It's called La Tehuana because she is wearing the traditional dress.
Initially this was Dolores Olmedo’s home. It became a museum in 1994. Here’s a statue of her that shows part of the beautiful grounds.
There were hundreds of peacocks at the museum, all calmly hanging out.
Olmedo loved Xoloiztquintle dogs, a hairless breed from the Aztecs. There are 13 dogs at the museum.
This one named Maya was very friendly.
Pete is next to a statue of Diego Rivera's head.
On our final day in CDMX we went to National University of Mexico (UNAM) and checked out the Contemporary Art Museum. The statue is by Rufino Tamayo.
The UNAM library is covered in murals made of mosaics by Juan O’Gorman.
We love Mexico, and our time in these two vibrant cities was wonderful.
