Hispanic Research Journal, Vol. 8, No. 5, December 2007, 491–506 Mexico City in Juan O’Gorman’s Imagination Adriana Zavala Tufts University This essay offers a new interpretation of Juan O’Gorman’s Paisaje de la Ciudad de México (1949), which won first prize in a contest sponsored by the Mexico City newspaper Excelsior that year. Since then, the painting has been hailed as a positive representation of Mexico City that seems to support the policies of the government of Miguel Alemán. Undertaking a careful icono- graphic analysis of the painting, and situating it in relation to the artist’s other works, including his extensive writing on architecture, I argue that the painting is a critique of the ideological shifts and the developmentalist policies underway in the 1940s. O’Gorman is also hailed as the founding father of architectural modernism in Mexico, but his criticism of the style and its politics has not been brought to bear on his pictorial production. In 1936, O’Gorman abandoned architecture and turned to painting. His pessimistic images have been categorized as Surrealist, but have yet to be examined contextually. This essay recontextualizes Paisaje de la Ciudad de México, consider- ing its sources, ranging from Diego Rivera to Ambrogio Lorenzetti. It then reflects on O’Gorman’s engagement with the ideological shifts of the 1940s and with the modernization of the urban environment. Introduction In 1949, Juan O‘Gorman‘s Paisaje de la Ciudad de México (Figure 1) won first prize in a competition sponsored by the Mexico City newspaper Excelsior. The theme was ‘Mexico City Interpreted by its Painters’, and the contest was intended to provide an opportunity to celebrate the physical aspect of the capital city, its people and customs (Excelsior 1949a: 7). In accounting for the selection of O’Gorman’s painting as the prize- winner among over 200 works by one hundred and fifty artists, the jury stated that O’Gorman’s was chosen because it was superior in its originality and artistic qualities, including an excellent composition, fine drawing and exquisite handling of colour and medium. The commentary noted as well, that the ‘symbolic elements conjoined the idea of yesterday, of today and of always [...] The humble image of the anonymous but effective builder of the city, gave the painting a positive meaning, and secured for it a place among the great vistas of the city’ (Excelsior 1949b: 9). Following that assessment, scholars have since interpreted O’Gorman’s painting as an ‘optimistic’ and ‘meticulous rendition’ of Mexico City, particularly when compared with the other works that were awarded second, third and fourth prizes respectively (Ramírez 1995a; Pérez Gavilán 2005). Paisaje de la Ciudad de México offers the viewer a panoramic view of the Mexico City skyline. The downtown area is seen from the west and the image appears to be cartographically accurate. A map, held up by a pair of hands in the extreme foreground, Address correspondence to: Adriana Zavala, Department of Art and Art History, Tufts University, 11 Talbot Avenue, Medford, MA 02155, USA; adriana.zavala@tufts.edu © Queen Mary, University of London, 2007 DOI: 10.1179/174582007X245320