Mexican Culture is a fascinating blend of Native American traditions and Spanish colonial influences. Long before the Spaniards arrived in the 16th Century, the indigenous civilizations of Mexico had been developing arts such as ceramics, music, poetry, sculpture and weaving.
After the Conquest, the intricate designs and bright colours of many Mexican arts were often mixed with European techniques and religious themes to create a hybrid and uniquely Mexican artistic style. Numerous churches constructed during the Colonial era reflect the blending of Spanish architectural designs with the handiwork of the Mexicans who built and decorated the structures.
Mexico has a centuries-old rooted culture; therefore, many of the country’s most popular modern crafts such as textiles, pottery and furniture-making, borrow designs and techniques from pre-Hispanic periods. Mexican painting and music have also been shaped by this heritage.
Mexico has produced numerous writers, essayists and poets of international renown, including Octavio Paz, who in 1990 became the first Mexican to receive the Nobel Prize in literature. Carlos Fuentes is another writer whose fiction is widely read in Europe and in the United States.
Mexican painting is best known for the artists who did their work after the Mexican Revolution of 1910. Beginning in the 1920’s, Jose Orozco, Diego Rivera and David Alfaro Siqueiros painted the story of the Revolution on the walls of public buildings. Important Mexican painters of later years include Rufino Tamayo and Jose Luis Cuevas.
