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Murals in Dialogue: Muralism as a Communitary Practice in Charapan, Michoacán (2025)
Se les va a pasar un aviso (SLVAPUA) is a community-created podcast developed by Cristina Ochoa Ochoa, Luz Ochoa Ochoa, and Paulina Ascencio Fuentes. The project documents and shares the soundscape of Charapan, Michoacán, highlighting locally authored works and oral traditions that have endured across generations.
Murals in Dialogue approaches art as a means of fostering encounters, building shared memories, and generating situated interpretations of cultural heritage. In Charapan, muralism was explored as a collective practice capable of connecting past and present through dialogue and shared experience. This initiative by the Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes is presented within the framework of the Year of Indigenous Women, with the aim of making visible the voices and knowledge of Mexico’s Indigenous peoples.
The project consisted of bringing a reproduction of a work by Diego Rivera into a local context in order to generate a dialogue between art, collective memory, and regional identity. Beginning with a recreation of Carnaval de la vida mexicana (Carnival of Mexican Life, 1936), sixth-grade students from the Escuela Bilingüe Tata Vasco in Charapan, Michoacán, participated in multisensory activities including projections, puzzles, playing cards, and portrait-making exercises.
Throughout the process, students reflected on what it means to be P’urhépecha, what it means to be Mexican, and how both identities intertwine in the present. These conversations were recorded in three audio capsules that combine children’s voices, traditional music, and environmental soundscapes. The experience highlighted local traditions while encouraging reflections on identity, carnival, and representations of Indigenous peoples, confronting images of the past with those of a living and constantly evolving present.
The process culminated with the installation of a printed replica of the mural in the town’s central square. In this way, the mural became integrated into community life, accompanying activities such as processions, gatherings, and local celebrations.
The results of the project will be presented at the Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes through a listening station installed in front of Rivera’s original mural. Murals in Dialogue will be open to the public beginning December 9, Tuesday through Sunday, from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.
Further information will be available through the museum’s social media channels. On Facebook: Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes; on Instagram and X: @mbellasartes; as well as on the Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes website.