Architecture of Mexico: Difference between revisions

A replica of El Ángel in front of the National Palace in Mexico City.

In a broad sense, Mexican architecture comprises works of architecture created in Mexico, as well as architecture of pre-hispanic and colonial times that have become part of Mexico's architectural heritage. Moreover, architectural styles of the independent nation have a strong influence from those previous epochs; therefore it is necessary to include them as part of this heritage.

Prehispanic Period

Monte Albán, acropolis of the central valleys of Oaxaca.

The Palace at Palenque.

Pyramid of the Sun at Teotihuacan.

File:Chichen-Itza El Castillo.jpg

El Castillo at Chichen Itza.

Uxmal South Building of Nunnery Quadrangle, with the Pyramid of the Magician in the background.

Temple of Warriors at Chichen Itza.

La Quemada in the center-north.

Pyramid of the Niches at El Tajín.

Statues at Tula.

The presence of man in the Mexican territory has left important archaeological finds of great importance for the explanation of the habitat of early man and modern man. Mesoamerican civilizations have achieved great stylistic development and proportion in human and urban scale, the form evolved from simplicity to complexity aesthetic; in the north it manifests architecture of adobe and stone, the multifamily housing as it see in Paquimé, and the cave dwelling in caves of the Sierra Madre Occidental.

Monte Albán was for long the seat of the dominant power in the region of the Central Valleys of Oaxaca, from the decline of San José Mogote until the sundown of the city, occurred around the 9th century. The old name of this city founded by the Zapotecs in late Preclassic is the subject of discussion. According to some sources, the original name was Dani Baá. It is known, however, that the Mixtec known the city as Yuku kúi (Mixtec language: Yúku kúi, "Green Hill").

Like most of the great Mesoamerican cities, Monte Albán was a city with a multiethnic population. Throughout its history, the city maintained strong ties to other major peoples in Mesoamerica, especially with the Teotihuacans during the Early Classic. The city was abandoned by the elite and much of its population at the end of Phase Xoo. However, the ceremonial enclosure that constitute the complex of archeological site of Monte Albán was reused for the Mixtec during the Postclassic period. By this time, the Zapotec people's political power was divided among various city-states, as Zaachila, Yagul, Lambityeco and Tehuantepec.

It is believed that the Maya founded Lakam Ha during the Formative period (2500 B.C. - 300 A.D.), about 100 B.C., predominantly as a farmer village, and favored by numerous springs and streams in the region.

The population grew during the Early Classic period (200-600), to be a city, becoming the capital of the region of B'akaal (bone), comprised in the area of ​​Chiapas and Tabasco, in the Late Classic period (600-900). The oldest of the structures that have been discovered was built around the year 600.

B'akaal was an important center of Mayan civilization between the 5th and 9th centuries, during which alternated times of glory and disaster, alliances and wars. On more than one occasion made alliances with Tikal, the other great Mayan city of the time, especially to contain the spread of militant Calakmul, also called "Kingdom of the Serpent". Calakmul was victorious twice, in 599 and 611.

B'akaal rulers claimed that the origin of their lineage came from the distant past, some even boasting come from prehistoric times, leading to the creation of the world, which in Mayan mythology, was in the year 3114 B.C. Modern archaeological theories speculate that the first dynasty of their rulers was probably Olmec.

During the Phase Tollan, the city had reached its greatest extent and population. Some authors estimate urban surface Tollan-Xicocotitlan between 5 and 16 km² for the time, with a population of between 16,000 and 55,000 peoples. During this phase should consolidate monumental space that constitutes the current archaeological zone of Tula, consistent into two pyramidal bases, two courts for the ballgame and several palaces that could be occupied by the Toltec elite. By this time, Tollan-Xicocotitlan became not only the heart of the Mesoamerican commercial networks. Also hosted a military-theocratic elite who imposed their dominance in various parts of Mesoamerica, were by military conquest, or political alliance or by establishing colonies in strategic places.

Teotihuacan was inscribed on the list of World Heritage Site by Unesco in 1987. Despite what might be assumed given the large number of monuments, the Teotihuacan archaeological excavations continue to this day, and have resulted in a gradual increase in the quality and quantity of knowledge it have about this city, which, incidentally, are unknown issues as important as its original name and the ethnic affiliation of its founders. It is known, however, that was a cosmopolitan place, by the documented presence of groups from the Gulf Coast or the Central Valleys of Oaxaca.

Comalcalco, only Mayan city built of baked brick and stucco.

Located in the town of Tzintzuntzan in the municipality of the same name. The settlement is located on the Yahuarato hillside, where it became an esplanade, the location allowed have visual domain of Lake Pátzcuaro, in addition to providing protection. The zone is formed by 5 pyramids called "Yácatas" that having rectangular shape and semicircle since its staggered basis, besides other architectural. The yácatas were the main ceremonial center. The site was the last capital of the Purepecha empire. It has a small archaeological museum.

Puuc style

The buildings of Chichen Itza show a large number of architectural and iconographic elements that some historians have wanted to call Mexicanized. The truth is that it is visible the influence of cultures from central Mexico, and mixing with the Puuc style, from the upper peninsula, of Classic Maya architecture. The presence of these elements from the cultures of the plateau were conceived several years ago as a result of a mass migration or conquest of the Maya city by Toltec groups. However, recent studies suggest that may have been the cultural expression of a prestigious and widespread political system during the Early Postclassic in Mesoamerica.

Oasisoamericano style

Multi-family room in Paquimé.

The adobe houses troglodytes of Casas Grandes.

Oasisomericanos peoples had great contact with the peoples of Mesoamerica and the Northern Hemisphere, this leads to a unique style of construction in the Americas, their influence is marked primarily by commercial activities between the north and south. The archaeology is a bit compared to the construction of Chan Chan in northern Peru.

Paquimé was a prehistoric settlement that influenced in the northwest of the Sierra Madre Occidental, the most of western Chihuahua and some areas of the states of Sonora, Arizona, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico. Researchers estimate that the population probably grew to about 3,500 inhabitants, but is unaware of their linguistic and ethnic affiliation.

The site is famous for its adobe buildings and "T" form doors. Of its total length is only a fraction fenced and a less excavated. Its buildings have traits of Oasisamerica culture and demonstrates the skill of the prehispanic architects of the region making adobe multifamily houses up to four levels high with wooden, reed, stone and adobe.

Colonial Period

See also: List_of_cathedrals § Mexico

Main article: Mendicant monasteries in Mexico

Interior of Yuriria Convent.

The Cathedral of Yucatán is an example of Renaissance style.

Interior of the Convent of Tzintzuntzan.

With the arrival of the Spanish were introduced architectural theories of classical order and Arabic formalities, to build the first churches and monasteries monastic; it projected models uniques in its kind that were the basis for the evangelization of indigenous peoples marking their ideology within Architectural style called tequitqui (from Nahuatl; worker or mason), years later the baroque and mannerism are imposed in great cathedrals and civic buildings, while in rural areas are built haciendas or manor farms with Mozarabic trends.

The mendicant monasteries were one of the architectural solutions devised by the friars of the mendicant orders in the 16th century for Evangelization in New Spain, designed for a huge number of indigenous non-Catholics. Were based on European monastic model, but added innovative elements in New Spain as atrial cross and the open chapel, also characterized by hold different trends decorative and sturdy appearance as military fortresses.

The religious function of these buildings was thought for a huge number of Indians to evangelize, but early in the policy of reductions the set became the training center of its communities and ways of western civilians, the Castilian, various arts and trades, health, and even funerals.

Within these buildings, spread across the center of the current Mexico and mastery superb examples of architecture and decor, is possible to find an art originated both in stone carving and decoration painting: art tequitqui or indo-christian, a kind of style made by Indians who built the buildings based on European standards and directed by the friars.

The first cathedrals were built since 1521 when it was founded the New Spain, from that time have built ever more elaborate than the last as the Cathedral of Yucatán which is considered the second cathedral of Mexico with a Renaissance style.

The New Spanish Baroque

Tunnels of the city of Guanajuato.

Church of Santa Prisca in Taxco, Mexican churrigueresque.

Central courtyard of the government palace of Michoacán.

Chapel of the Rosary in the Church of Santo Domingo, Puebla.

Ex-Convent of San Agustín in Querétaro.

The combination of Indian and Arabic decorative influences, with an extremely expressive interpretation of the churrigueresque, could explain the variety and intensity of the Baroque in New Spain. Even more than its Spanish counterpart, the American Baroque developed as a style of stucco decoration. Twin towers facades of many American cathedrals of the 17th century have medieval roots.

To the north, the richest province of the 18th century, New Spain, the current Mexico, was a architecture fantastically extravagant and visually frenetic that is Mexican churrigueresque. This ultrabaroque style culminates in the works of Lorenzo Rodríguez, whose masterpiece is the Sagrario Metropolitano in Mexico City (1749-1769). Other notable examples are in remote mining towns. For example the sanctuary of Ocotlán (begun in 1745) is a first-Baroque cathedral, whose surface is covered with bright red tiles, which contrast with a plethora of compressed ornament applied generously on the front and sides of the towers. The true capital of Mexican Baroque is Puebla, where the abundance of hand painted tiles and local gray stone led to a very personal and localized evolution of style, with a pronounced Indian flavor.

The New Spanish Baroque is an artistic movement that appeared in what is now Mexico in the late 16th century, approximately, which was preserved until the mid-18th century. From the Portuguese word barrueco meaning unclean, mottled, flamboyant, daring, the most striking example of New Spanish Baroque art is in religious architecture, where indigenous artisans gave it a unique character. Highlights include the Metropolitan Cathedral of Mexico City with his Altar of the Kings, the church of Santa María Tonantzintla in the Puebla State, the Jesuit convent of Tepotzotlán in the State of Mexico, the Chapel of the Rosary in the church of Santo Domingo of the city of Puebla, the convent and the church of Santo Domingo de Guzmán in Oaxaca, and the church of Santa Prisca in Taxco, Guerrero State.

The ethos baroque shook in Mexico the forms and classic proportions to help and forge a Mexican identity. The New Spanish Baroque is the rediscovery and re-founding of the Spanish heritage, from the 17th century. The Baroque style is an experience of cultural survival by indigenous, enriching and transforming. Mexico and the Baroque share its history with the arrival of the Iberian-European civilization and cultural mix.

The marginal population of the New Spanish cities, overwhelmingly indigenous and romani, undertook, by the 17th century, the construction of a new identity (at the failure of the attempt to impose simply European culture through evangelism). Were mostly indigenous people resident in cities, taking advantage of its otherness, were able to reconstruct the forms came from Europe. The Indians had seen their world crumbling ancestral and were forced to change their identity, adopting the forms and techniques of the conquerors but with a proper content. As a result, also transformed the way of see the world of New Spanish Criollos and Mestizos, forgers all of the current Mexican society.

New Spanish great works

Puebla Cathedral is an example of Herrerian Baroque.

[[File:Catedral de México.jpg|thumb|left|200px|The Metropolitan Cathedral of Mexico City. [[File:Durango palacio.jpg|thumb|Portal of Palacio de Zambrano in Durango of sober Baroque]] The cathedrals of New Spain are good examples of madera style. During the 15th century began to build great cathedrals with predominant of Plateresque style and late Gothic.

In the culminating point of the Spanish Baroque was expressed the Churrigueresque, the Herrerian style and New Spanish Baroque with indigenous polychrome elements.

Undoubtedly the Cathedral of Puebla has the highest mix of architectural styles, and that makes it unique in the world as a good example of viceroyal architecture.

The Biblioteca Palafoxiana is considered the first public library in the Americas. Founded by Bishop Juan de Palafox y Mendoza in 1646.

Located in the historic center of Puebla, this library is pride of Baroque and Monument in Mexico since 1981. Bishop Palafox donated his personal library, composed of five thousand volumes before the notary Nicolás de Valdivia on September 5, 1646, to be consulted by all those who wish to study, because its main condition was that it was open to the public and not just to ecclesiastics and seminarians.

The creation of this library was approved by royal charter in December 1647 and reconfirmed by Pope Innocent X in 1648. For over 360 years, the Biblioteca Palafoxiana, has been sitting in the Formae College of San Juan in the seminary founded by Palafox y Mendoza. While the construction of the dome, as found today was made in 1773, by Bishop Francisco de Fabián y Fuero, who ordered the construction of the first two floors of the shelf, which is a fine work of New Spanish cabinetmakers who worked harmoniously the ayacahuite, cedar and wild sunflower woods. From this period dates the delicate altarpiece which houses the effigy of the Madonna of Trapani, oil that was presumably made modeled the sculpture by Nino Pisano made of the Virgin in the 14th century. Later, in the 19th century, was placed a third level because they had increased the number of volumes that were in the library.

Religious missions

Mission San Xavier del Bac in Tucson.

Misión San Ignacio Kadakaamán in Baja California Sur.

[[File:Sierra gorda.jpg|thumb|right|150px|The indigenous baroque in Sierra Gorda missions. [[File:ChurchNorthGroupMitla.JPG|thumb|left|200px|Mitla in Oaxaca. [[File:Taos Pueblo Church2.jpg|thumb|left|200px|Taos Pueblo and New Mexico missions.

File:Tekanto San Agustin.jpg

Tekantó Mission in Yucatán.

After Mexico's independence in 1821, the mission of Our Lady of Loreto went into decline, the Pious Fund of the Californias instituted in favor of the Jesuits by the Marquis de la Peña Villapuente and his wife the Marchioness de las Torres de Rada to support the evangelization of the Californias disappeared with his expulsion, the natives of the region disappeared by the diseases the Europeans brought to the peninsula, the Franciscans to march to the place ceded Alta California to the Dominicans brought not the substance of the first missionaries, mission yet survived abandonment, unlike many other missions founded in Baja California by Jesuits, Franciscans and Dominicans were left to disappear completely. Today the Mission of Our Lady of Loreto is the jewel of the missions founded in the peninsula. The revival of the economy and communications infrastructure construction in Baja California Sur from the last century has been of benefit to the mission, gone are the days of deprivation. In 1992, the town of Loreto, the ancient capital of Las Californias capital reached the rank of town. The mission was founded in 1699 by Jesuit missionary Eusebio Francisco Kino, who often visited and preached in the area. The original mission church, approximately 3 kilometers () away, was vulnerable to Apache attacks who finally destroyed by the year 1770. Carlos III of Spain banned all Jesuits from Spanish lands in America in 1767 because of their distrust of the Jesuits. At this time, the Mission San Xavier del Bac was conducted by the Franciscans more flexible "and reliable." The current building was constructed under the direction of Franciscan Fathers Juan Bautista and Juan Bautista Llorenz Velderrain mainly native labor, which did the work in the period 1783-1797, with a loan of 7,000 pesos and is mainly used by the Christian community of the District of Tohono O'odham. Unlike the other Spanish missions in Arizona, San Xavier continuously active and run by Franciscans, also continues to serve the native community for which it was built. Mission San Xavier and Indian converts were protected by the Royal Presidio of San Agustín del Tucson, established an Indian convert and were protected from Apache raids by the presidio of Tucson, established in 1775. Outside, the Mission, white, has a Moorish-inspired design, elegant and simple, with an ornately decorated entrance. There are no files for architects, builders, and craftsmen responsible for creating it and decorate it. Most of the work was provided by the local Indians, and believed they provided qeu artisan creativity. Guests entering the gates carved mesquite wood, struck by the freshness of the interior, and the dazzling colors of the paintings, carving, frescoes and statues. The interior is richly decorated with ornaments showing a mixture of New Spain and indigenous artistic embellishments. The plan of the church represents the classic Latin cross. The main hall is separated from the sanctuary by the transept chapels to one or the other end. The dome above the transept is 16 m high and is supported by arches and esquinches. At least three different artists painted the artwork inside the church. Mission is considered the finest Spanish architecture in the United States.

19th and early 20th Century Architecture

Townscapes changed little during the first half of the 19th century in Mexico, until the French occupation during the Second Mexican Empire in the 1860s. Emperor Maximilian I brought a new set of urban design ideas to Mexico. Drawing from the mid-century Parisian revelopment plan of Baron Haussmann, Maximillain administered the building of a broad new diagonal avenue- Paseo de la Reforma. This elegant boulevard ran for kilometers from the downtown National Palace to the lush Chapultepec Park where the Austrian ruler lived in the Chapultepec Castle. Along the Reforma, double rows of eucalyptus trees were planted, gas lamps installed, and the first mule-drawn streetcars were introduced. The development was the catalyst for a new phase of growth from downtown Mexico City to the west, a direction that would define the city's structure for the next half century.

Monument to Cuahtémoc, Mexico City

[[File:Palacio de las Bellas Artes (Mexico City).jpg|thumb|left|200px|Palacio de Bellas Artes]]

Interior of the Postal Palace.

The Monumento a la Revolución in Mexico City

National Auditorium

During President Porfirio Diaz's reign (1876–1880, 1884–1911), patrons and practitioners of architecture manifested two impulses: to create an architecture that would indicate Mexico's participation in modernity and the emphasize Mexico's difference from other countries through the incorporation of local characteristics into the architecture. The first goal took precedence over the second during most of the 19th century.

A modern, sophisticated Mexico City was the goal of President Diaz. Cast iron technology from Europe and the United States allowed for new building designs. Italian marble, European granite, bronzes and stained glass could now be imported. Diaz was determined to transform the landscape of the nation's capital into one reminiscent of Paris or London. It is not surprising that the most important architectural commissions of the Porfiriato were given to foreigners. Italian architect Adamo Boari designed the Postal Palace built by Gonzalo Garita (1902) and the National Theatre of Mexico (1904). The French architect Emile Benard, who worked on the Legislative Palace in 1903, founded an architectural studio where he took Mexican students. Silvio Contri was responsible for the Secretariat of Communications and Public Works (1902–11). Neo-Gothic designs incorporated into the monumental public buildings of the early 20th century. The two best examples were the Central post office and the Palacio de Bellas Artes, designed by Italian architect Adamo Boari.

President Diaz had enacted a decree in 1877 that called for the placement of a series of political statues of Mexican heroes along the Paseo de la Reforma. Classical designs were used to build structures such as the Angel of Independence monument, the monument to Cuauhtemoc, the monument to Benito Juárez, and the Columbus Statue. Diaz's conviction about the importance of public monuments in the urban landscape started a tradition that has become permanent in Mexico: public monuments in the 20th century landscape.

House of Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo (built by Juan O'Gorman in 1930)

In the 19th century, Neo-Indigenist architecture played an active part of the representation of national identity as constructed by the Porfirian regime. The representation of the local in Mexican architecture was achieved mainly through themes and decorative motifs inspired by pre-Hispanic antiquity. These representations were essential to the construction of a common heritage by which the nation might be unified. The first building based on the ancient Mexican motifs built in the 19th century was the monument to Cuauhtemoc exectuted by engineer Francisco Jimenez and the sculptor Miguel Norena. Other 19th-century buildings incorporating pre-Hispanic decorative motifs include the monument to Benito Juarez in Paseo Juarez, Oaxaca (1889).

At the beginning of the 20th century, Luis Zalazar enthusiastically encouraged architects to create a national style of architecture based on the study of pre-Hispanic ruins. His writings would be influential for the nationalistic tendencies in Mexican architecture which developed during the second and third decade of the 20th century.

After the Mexican Revolution, successive Mexican regimes would use the pre-Hispanic past to represent the nation. Later architects also took inspiration from the architecture of the colonial period and regional architecture as the creation of a genuinely Mexican architecture became a pressing issue during the 20th century.

Modern and Contemporary Architecture

La Torre Latinoamericana

File:Santa feconj Mexico City.jpg

Santa Fe business district, Mexico City

José Vasconcelos Library, designed by Alberto Kalach, in Mexico City

Fifteen years after the end of the Mexican Revolution in 1917, government endorsements for federal housing, educational, and health care building programs began. While the development of modern architecture in Mexico bears some noteworthy parallels to its North American and European counterparts, its trajectory highlights several unique characteristics, which challenged existing definitions modern architecture. During the post-Revolutionary period, idealization of the indigenous and the traditional symbolized attempts to reach into the past and retrieve what had been lost in the race toward modernization.

The Torre Mayor, the tallest building in Mexico.

Functionalism, expressionism, and other schools have left their imprint on a large number of works in which Mexican stylistic elements have been combined with European and North American techniques.

The Institute of Hygiene (1925) in Popotla, Mexico, by José Villagrán García, was one of the first examples of this new national architecture. The studio designed by Juan O'Gorman in San Angel, Mexico City, for Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo (1931–32) is a fine example of vanguard architecture built in Mexico. Mexico's first project of high-density, low-cost housing was the Centro Urbano Alemán (1947–49), Mexico City, by Mario Pani.

Perhaps the most ambitious project of modern architecture was the construction, begun in 1950, Ciudad Universitaria outside Mexico City, a complex of buildings and grounds housing the National Autonomous University of Mexico. A cooperative venture, the project was directed by Carlos Lazo, Enrique Del Moral, and Pani. In the new campus the art of the Mexican muralists was incorporated into the architecture, beginning with Rivera's relief in the new Estadio Olímpico Universitario (1952), by Augusto Pérez Palacios, Jorge Bravo, and Raúl Salinas. The Rectory (1952), by Pani, del Moral, and Salvador Ortega Flores, includes murals by David Alfaro Siqueiros. Perhaps the best integration of mural art with the new architecture is seen in the University Library, by O’Gorman, Gustavo Saavedra, and Juan Martínez de Velasco, which features a monumental mosaic design on the facade by O’Gorman. Another architect of note is Felix Candela, who designed the expressionistic church Nuestra Señora de los Milagros.

This was a period of diverse experimentation and even structural innovation, as seen in the thin-shell concrete structures by the Spanish architect Felix Candela, such as his Church of the Miraculous Virgin (1953) in Mexico City and the Cosmic Ray Pavilion (1952) on the university campus. The integration of art and architecture became a constant in Mexican modern architecture, which can be seen in the courtyard of the Anthropology Museum (c. 1963–65) in Mexico City, by Pedro Ramírez Vázquez.

Antara Shopping Center.

Another side of Mexican modern architecture is represented in the work of Luis Barragán. The houses that he designed in the 1950s and ’60s explored a way to reconcile the lessons of Le Corbusier with the Spanish colonial tradition. This new synthesis created a completely original Modernist architecture that is uniquely adapted to its environment.

Ricardo Legorreta's Camino Real Hotel (1968) in Mexico City is a composition of courtyards and roof terraces within the walls of one downtown block. This work is indebted to the work of Barragán, applying his methods on a larger public scale. In Mexico the Brutalism of Teodoro González de León's Music Conservatory (1994) and the Neo-Barragánesque library (1994) by Legorreta coexist in the new National Centre of the Arts with the work of a younger generation of architects who are influenced by contemporary architecture in Europe and North America.

The School of Theatre (1994), by TEN Arquitectos, and the School of Dance (1994), by Luis Vicente Flores, express a modernity that reinforces the government's desire to present a new image of Mexico as an industrialized country with a global presence. Enrique Norten, the founder of TEN Arquitectors, was presented with the "Legacy Award" by the Smithsonian Institution for his contributions to the US arts and culture through his work. In 2005 he received the "Leonardo da Vinci" World Award of Arts by the World Cultural Council and was the first Mies van der Rohe Award recipient for Latin American Architecture.

The refined work of Alberto Kalach and Daniel Alvarez stands out both in their numerous residences as well as in the San Juan de Letrán Station (1994) in Mexico City. The residential work of José Antonio Aldrete-Haas in Mexico City shows both the influence of the attenuated Modernism of the great Portuguese architect Álvaro Siza and a continuity with the lessons of Barragán. Other notable and emerging contemporary architects include Mario Schjetnan, Michel Rojkind, Tatiana Bilbao, Isaac Broid and Bernardo Gómez-Pimienta, with award winning works in Mexico, USA and Europe.

See also

Main article: List of Mexican architects

Category:Mexican architects