The talk La memoria de las piedras. Los petro-murales de Juan O’Gorman [Memory of the stones. The petro-murals of Juan O’Gorman], participated in the commemoration of 100 years of Mexican muralism, organized by CENIDIAP and INBAL under the title “Let’s talk about Muralism”. M. Adriana Sandoval, Director of the Espacio Nancarrow O’Gorman Foundation and specialist in the work of Juan O’Gorman, presented the synthesis of a ten-year research work on the petro-murals of Juan O’Gorman where they were approached from their physical, conceptual and discursive qualities.

During the talk, the Biblioteca Central (Central Library), the heart of Ciudad Universitaria, an emblematic building of Mexico in the world, constructed by Gustavo Saavedra, Juan Martínez de Velasco, and Juan O’Gorman, whose petro-mural covering was made from 1951 to 1952 under the authorship of O’Gorman, was positioned as the main object of study. The Anahuacalli and the study of Frida Kahlo were also mentioned as antecedents of the Central Library.

One of the main focuses of M. Adriana Sandoval is to point out that the stones that cover the murals imply a historical permanence thanks to their materiality, but also to the discourse they contain, given that O’Gorman was an uncomfortable architect for his time, in the 1950s. The walls of Biblioteca Central manifest a critical stance so as not to forget what they call to highlight: a historical debt linked to an incongruent modernity.