Along with a resplendent exterior that exhibits Art Nouveau and Neoclassical elements, the Palacio de Bellas Artes also houses extraordinary beauty within.
Masters of Mexican muralism have left their mark. With your Palacio de Bellas Artes ticket, keep an eye out for works by Rufino Tamayo once you're inside. Created in the 1950s, you'll find México de Hoy (Mexico Today), as well as Nacimiento de la Nacionalidad (Birth of Nationality), the latter displaying the symbolic depiction of the creation of the mestizo – someone of mixed indigenous and Spanish ancestry.
At the west end of the third floor is Diego Rivera's work from 1934, El hombre controlador del universo (Man, controller of the universe), a recreation of his work Man at the Crossroads that was originally intended for the Rockefeller Center in New York. The original painting was plastered over due to its inclusion of Lenin and a Soviet May Day parade, but the Rockefeller's loss is the Palacio de Bellas Artes' gain.
Also on show is David Alfaro Siqueiros' three-part La Nueva Democracía (New Democracy); Rivera's four-part Carnaval de la Vida Mexicana (Carnival of Mexican Life); and José Clemente Orozco's La Katharsis (Catharsis), which depicts the conflict between humankind's social and natural tendencies.