Museo Nacional de Antropologia

a month of visits

16.04.2009 17 °C

I love me a good art museum. LOVE science museums as well. The other museums generally fall into a gray area for me. Anything with names and dates that aren't extraordinary to look at generally bore me. I saw some of the oldest stuff known to man in Taipei's National Museum (mostly artwork and artifacts from Beijing's Forbidden City)...I'm talking TENS of THOUSANDS of years old...after about 5 minutes I yawned my way out of there.

So I guess what I'm saying is that, museum-wise, it takes a lot to impress me. I was told that this particular museum (located in Mexico City's Chapultepec Forest) would need a full month to be fully, FULLY explored. We had a full...2 hours. In the whirlwind tour we did of modern-day native peoples, I became intrigued but definitely not fulfilled. If I do decide to live in Mexico City this coming year (it's about 50-50 right now), I will have all the time in the world to fully explore and satisfy my curiosity.

Monumento a Los Niños Héroes, a handful of military cadets that gave their lives defending Chapultepec Castle.

We happened upon a series of bronze statues by Leonora Carrington. This one is called "Musica para los Sordos," or Music for the Deaf.

Another one by Carrington.

Chapultepec means "hill of the grasshoppers." This is the symbol, the chapulin.

Fountain inside of the museum.

Ancient skull, which I believe is from Baja.

A jug of a man thinking. A real thinking man's jug.

Smoking calabaza from a tree of the dead.

A Nahuatl text.

A picture of a picture of a Mayan man dressed as a butterfly.

A volador de Papantla. It is a ritual originating in Veracruz; 5 men climb atop a pole and "fly" as their ropes unwind. Pretty impressive, especially since one of them is playing a flute the whole time.