page_title: Mexico
section_title: Photography
hierarchical_section_title: Mexico / Culture / Photography
caption_attribution_description: Español: Lecumberri, México, D.F., 1960. Archivo fotográfico Héctor y María García
context_page_description: Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and to the east by the Gulf of Mexico. Mexico covers 1,972,550 square kilometers and has approximately 128,649,565 inhabitants, making it the world's 13th-largest country by area, 10th-most populous country, and most populous Spanish-speaking nation. It is a federation comprising 31 states and Mexico City, its capital city and largest metropolis. Other major urban areas include Guadalajara, Monterrey, Puebla, Toluca, Tijuana, Ciudad Juárez, and León.
  Pre-Columbian Mexico traces its origins to 8,000 BC and is identified as one of six cradles of civilization; it was home to many advanced Mesoamerican civilizations, most well-known among them the Maya and the Aztecs. In 1521, the Spanish Empire conquered and colonized the territory from its base in Mexico City, which then became known as New Spain. The Catholic Church played an important role as millions of indigenous inhabitants converted.
context_section_description: Mexico has been photographed since the nineteenth century when the technology was first developed. During the Porfiriato, Díaz realized the importance of photography in shaping the understanding of his regime and its accomplishments.  The government hired Guillermo Kahlo (father of painter Frida Kahlo) to create photographic images of Mexico's new industrial structures as well as its pre-Hispanic and colonial past.  Photographer Hugo Brehme specialized in images of "picturesque" Mexico, with images of Mexican places and often rural people.  During the Mexican Revolution, photographers chronicled the conflict, usually in the aftermath of a battle, since large and heavy equipment did not permit action shots. Agustín Victor Casasola is the most famous photographer of the revolutionary era, and he collected other photographers' images in the Casasola Archive; his vast collection was purchased by the Mexican government and is now part of the government photographic repository, the Fototeca. After the revolution, Mexican photographers created photographs as art images.  Among others, notable Mexican photographers include Manuel Álvarez Bravo, Héctor García Cobo, and Graciela Iturbide.
caption: David Alfaro Siqueiros by Héctor García Cobo at Lecumberri prison, Mexico City, 1960.
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