Mexico City has more than 150 museums, but most are pretty obscure. There are museums for engraving, women, the revolution, chocolate, all cultures that have ever existed in Mexico, medicine, photography, constitutions, murals, any remotely famous people (including Jesus) and caricatures, to name just a few.
I made it to about half a dozen while I was there—mainly the ones that offered something about Frida and Diego er, Diego Rivera and or Frida Kahlo—since they were the reason for my trip to Mexico City. Here are the museums I visited worth your time too.
1 Palacio de Bellas Artes
This place, aptly named, is beautiful just to look at. If you like architecture or gorgeous places, you want to make this stop. I went there to see the Diego Rivera murals they have. That’s the darned thing about murals—you can’t move them, so a trip to Mexico was necessary.
I grew up in Detroit, where we have the spectacular Diego Rivera Industry Murals that he painted about the automobile industry at the Detroit Institute of Arts. They’re one of, if not my very favorite thing in Detroit (besides my family). I once wrote my Spanish final exam essay project about Rivera in college. That’s when I became obsessed with his wife – a little lady named Frida Kahlo.
So, my trip to Mexico has been a long time coming. The palace is vast, so finding the murals, despite their massive size, took some searching. Lucky for me, the murals were the only section they allowed visitors to see that day. (They’re supposed to have good impressionist art, which I was hoping to see, but alas, nothing was on view.)
But, under a glowing glass-filled atrium, several Rivera murals are on display in the center of the palace. If you’ve seen his work, they’re immediately familiar. The murals are rich, colorful and filled with secret and not-so-secret meanings and symbolism. Mostly he threw shots at the politicians and policies of his time. Some of his murals no longer exist for this reason.
It’s free to visit on Sunday. Find more about the museum here. Watch a video with more images here.
2 Diego Rivera Mural Museum
Since I was in the neighborhood, I walked through the park to the Diego Rivera Mural Museum a few blocks away.
Essentially, there’s only one reason you would go to this small museum—to see Sueño de Una Tarde Dominical en la Alameda Central (Dream of a Sunday Afternoon in Alameda Park). I can’t help but think of another famous painting with the same theme and similar title, “A Sunday on La Grande Jatte,” by renowned pointillism artist Georges Seurat (at the Chicago Art Institute).
This mural is, to me, Rivera’s most famous. So famous, in fact, they built a building around it so they could protect it and charge people to look at it. The only other things you’ll see at this museum are sketches in the other room.
Also free on Sunday, this museum will only take you a few minutes to go through—depending on how long you stare at one piece of art. Granted, that one piece of art takes up an entire wall and has some 50 characters to examine, including Diego himself, Frida, and the famed depiction of the “Caterina” skeleton. Renowned Mexican Illustrator Jose Guadalupe Posada (also in the mural) first created the Caterina figure now beloved by Mexico and tourists alike.
Despite this being a museum with only one artwork, it still gets crowded—that’s how spectacular and beloved it is. So you’ll have to jockey for a position, but it’s good to spend some time absorbing great art anyway, so no worries.
Find out more about visiting the museum here.
3 Frida Kahlo Home & Museum
Of course, it’s Diego’s wife that most of us Americans are enamored with.
About 45 minutes outside of Mexico City, her house is now a museum. She was born, lived and died there – except for several years when she lived elsewhere with her philandering husband, Diego Rivera.
This is the second most popular museum in Mexico City—out of 150—so that’s telling you something. One, it’s busy (it sells out weeks in advance), and two, women who thrive against the odds are worth celebrating.
The house is much as she left it on the day she died and now features several of her best and most famous artworks, many others you’ve never seen before, and a lifetime of memorabilia, clothing, and accessories she was famous for. I went to this museum twice it was so good.
Read my blog and watch a video about the Frida Kahlo museum here.
4 Diego Rivera / Frida Kahlo House and Museum
Ok, by now, you’re spotting a theme. Almost every museum I went to had to do with Diego and or Frida. This is why I came to Mexico City, after all.
This museum will be familiar if you’ve ever seen the movie “Frida,” starring Selma Hayek. Of course, like Frida’s house, it used to be a home, not a museum, or, as I like to call it, “every married couple’s dream.” This is where Diego had one house, and Frida had another, each connected to the other by a bridge across the roof. If my first husband and I had this, maybe he wouldn’t be an ex. Nah.
Frida and Diego only lived there together for about seven years, but it’s iconic. In Diego’s house, you can see a collection of papier-mâché figures, skeletons, people and animals. The only thing that retains the original furniture at Frida’s house is the bathroom tub. The tub appears in the painting “Lo Que el agua me dio (What the water gave me).”
These two homes are bizarrely spartan and minimalist—this coming from a woman who owns little enough to fit it all in a 10-foot van. There is absolutely no luxury, warmth, or comfort present. But there is a great workspace and studio for creation. I suppose that’s all you need.
Of course, the twin houses (his white and red and hers, blue) were designed by the famed painter and architect Juan O’Gorman, who also lived in a house on the property surrounded by giant organ cactus’. Gorman called the style “Mexican functionalism.” All concrete and oversized windows. Boy, I bet he had some stories to tell.
The best part for me was walking across that iconic bridge. The bridge itself wasn’t necessary, but it’s so symbolic, two people, connected but free.
Read more about the house here.
5 National Museum of Anthropology
I went to the anthropology museum because several people I met in Mexico City told me I had to see it. Everyone raved about how great it was, so I was underwhelmed. I probably would have liked it more if I hadn’t been told anything about how great the museum was. That said, it is a stunning place.
As it was, the museum was just a bunch of old rocks. LOL. I’m kidding, sort of. The best stuff from tombs and dwellings were recreation. The pyramid artifacts were cool, but there were a lot of art objects were pulled from the ruins all over Mexico. If you’re an archeologist, I bet you would LOVE it here. For me, it all looked similar after a few dozen examples.
In case you’re wondering, there are a LOT of ruins in Mexico, so there’s a lot to see. I walked for hours through the museum and saw repetition with slight variation within each century. Change is slow. There was jewelry made of stones, fiber and metal. In the end, there was weaving and textiles, and that was interesting. Much of it was interesting, and you can see most of it at other museums, but not at the scale that you’ll find here.
Once you’ve gone to several of these historic sites and communities where they’re still making and selling these textiles and jewelry and pottery, the museum feels removed. But, it also gives you the details and history you won’t find in an afternoon strolling the pyramids or other sites.
The best thing about this museum is its sheer size, the comprehensive number of artifacts from very distinct areas and eras, and the way they’re organized. The museum takes you from the beginning of documented history to the current history in a cohesive timeline so you can see progress happening. (Note that not a lot has changed in Mexico, really).
6 Teothuacan
It’s not a museum, per se, rather an archeological site. Teotihuacán, according to Aztec tradition, is where the sun, the moon, and the rest of the universe trace their origins. These pyramids are called “the place where the gods were created.” People have flocked to it for centuries, seeking wisdom, spiritual enlightenment, and the manifestation of dreams. The site holds three significant pyramids and various other ruins, and it’s the best “museum” in Mexico City.
Read more on my Mexico stories page here.
Claus Andersen
January 29, 2022Mexico City is my favourite museum city in the world. And Frida and Diego play a large part in me falling in love with the Mexico City as a museum city.
Rene Cizio
January 30, 2022Yes, you need to make several trips just to see half of the great museums.