Palacio de Bellas Artes
Mexico City's great cultural palace, wrapped in marble and murals.
The Palacio de Bellas Artes is Mexico City's most celebrated cultural building — a monumental arts center that has served as the country's premier stage for opera, dance, and the visual arts since 1934. Its exterior is a jaw-dropping fusion of Art Nouveau and Art Deco styles, clad in Italian Carrara marble that has caused the building to slowly sink into the soft lakebed soil beneath the city, giving it a slight, legendary tilt. Inside, the main theater features a famous glass curtain designed by Tiffany Studios in New York, made from nearly a million pieces of colored glass depicting the volcanoes Popocatépetl and Iztaccíhuatl — it's only lowered on special occasions, so catching it is genuinely special.
The museum floors above the theater are what draw most daytime visitors, and for good reason: the upper levels house some of the most important murals in Mexican art history, painted directly onto the walls by Diego Rivera, David Alfaro Siqueiros, José Clemente Orozco, and Rufino Tamayo. Rivera's 'Man at the Crossroads' — his recreation of the mural famously destroyed by the Rockefellers at Rockefeller Center — lives here on the third floor and is alone worth the trip. The galleries also rotate temporary exhibitions of Mexican and international modern art, so there's usually something new alongside the permanent murals.
Entry to the museum is inexpensive and free on Sundays for Mexican nationals, which makes weekend mornings significantly more crowded. The building sits at the western edge of the Alameda Central park, which means you can combine a visit with a stroll through one of the oldest urban parks in the Americas. For evening performances — ballet folklórico, opera, symphony — book ahead through the official website, as the Bellas Artes company and visiting productions regularly sell out.
