From calacas, xoloitzcuintles, dreads and engineers
There was death one day
talking to Dolores
art, xolos, and flowers:
the passions he had.
The surprised calaca
not as he stayed
and Dolores took
to know about his life.
Oh! that skinny tilica
now visit the Museum
to see ICA's history
and Dolores Olmedo.
Since its birth in 1994, El Museo Dolores Olmedo has maintained the tradition of presenting its visitors with an Offering of the Dead, which is a tribute to various characters and aspects of life. This year's is dedicated to architects and engineers, whose talent allowed to build the great infrastructure works of Mexico City. But behind this tribute is a little-known history, that of Dolores Olmedo and the construction company that sponsors the current offering, ICA.
María de los Dolores Olmedo and Patiño Suárez was a controversial, audacious woman, representing feminism in the twentieth century. She is recognized as a great collector of art, whose works are in the museum that bears her name south of Mexico City, also known as "Hacienda la Noria".
Lola Olmedo was born in Tacubaya in 1908, shortly before the Mexican revolution broke out, within the political and social context of early 20th-century Mexico. She was the eldest of the children of the marriage formed by the normalist teacher María Patiño Suárez and Manuel Olmedo Mayagoitia a professional who worked as an accountant and lawyer in some establishments in Mexico City.
He had a childhood marked by hunger and scarcity, partly by the death of his father, and also by the instability of the revolutionary period that caused situations of incommunicado and deabas to the inhabitants of the capital. As a result, she found it difficult to attend a school: her mother was in charge of educating her at the same school where she worked.
Years later she would help her by giving some drawing classes to groups of young children, since then she was interested in the arts. He then formally began his studies and covered the credits corresponding to the secondary school and later entered the National Preparatory School as a pre-National University requirement.
Dolores began her university studies in law school, pursuing her career for two years, even though in those times women who arrived at university were scarce; he also completed his studies in art at the Academy of San Carlos, and music at the National Conservatory, apprenticeships that over the years would be useful for him to teach later.
The need to work for her family led her to start a business. He received the offer to acquire a small tobacco company that he bought with enormous difficulties, requesting a loan from the National Bank of Mexico of Tacubaya. It adjoined another property of a German named Heriberto Pagelson, with whom he partnered and began acquiring tobacco nists in the Naucalpan area, taking over several over time.
In the 1940s he met Bernardo Quintana, teamed up with him to found a brick factory called Industria Cerámica Armada (ICA) predecessor company of the current company, whose acronyms were taken up. Later with the development of the country and its transformation through roads and access roads, roads, dams, schools, housing, etc., an urbanization project was initiated by ICA with 18 founders and several companies, among which was Dolores Olmedo and Pagelson.
In 1948 she became manager of CICSA (Real Estate Company and Builder) unusual activity for that time where women did not participate in business activities and much less related to construction. ICA, under the direction of Bernardo Quintana and other associate engineers, became the builder of many of Mexico's most representative structures, from the Basilica of Guadalupe to the Azteca Stadium.
In parallel with his business activity, Olmedo cultivated a great artistic sensibility and began to interact with people close to the environment, such as Diego Rivera whom he met in 1924, when he worked in the building of the Ministry of Public Education. From this came a lasting friendship based on a mutual interest in art and Lola's deep admiration. Another transcendent relationship was the one she established with Howard S. Philips, her future husband. He would become one of the most important figures for his intellectual training and would decisively promote many of his actions.
Philips, an English national, arrived in Mexico in 1923 as a journalist in charge of covering the notes around the Treaties of Bucarelli. He originally published the magazine Pulse of Mexico in business, financial and political court. A few months later the orientation of its publication changed and the monthly magazine Mexican Life emerged with a clear tendency towards artistic activity, in addition to spreading the tourist attractions of Mexico to foreigners.
He met Dolores when the magazine published a portrait that highlighted the extraordinary beauty of the lady. In 1935 they married and from the marriage they were four children. Through Philips, Dolores formally entered the world of culture, and it was between 1920 and 1932 that a group of contemporaries, to which belonged Carlos Pellicer, Salvador Novo, Jorge Cuesta, Xavier Villaurrutia, Jaime Torres Bodet, among others: the cream and cream of educated youth. Dolores and Howard separated in 1948, although he continued to live with her until 1957, when they divorced amicably.
Her income as an entrepreneur allowed her to acquire, over time, a large number of works of art and pre-Hispanic pieces. Several pieces were by Diego Rivera, who near his death, suggested he acquire ten more paintings to enrich his collection and secure his legacy.
In 1962 Dolores Olmedo decided to acquire the estate "La Noria", in Xochimilco, in addition to an extension of land around this colonial construction. It was on this estate that he relocated his collections. Later he created the Dolores Olmedo Patiño Museum Trust in order to house the 145 paintings of Diego Rivera, 25 by Frida Kahlo, 42 by Angelina Beloff, more than 600 pre-Hispanic pieces recognized and registered by the National Institute of Anthropology and History, several 18th century braised saints, his collection of folk art, 4,000 library books, peacocks, guajolotes, ducks, xoloitzcuintles dogs and an ecological garden with more than 25 varieties of Mexican plants and trees. Dolores Olmedo died on July 27, 2002 at his home in Xochimilco.
The temporary exhibition that rejoins the memory of Lola Olmedo and the company he founded, will be open from October 5 and until December 29 of this year. It presents 20 recreations of emblematic buildings, which visitors can discover during the tour, as well as public spaces and sculptures that have given identity to this city.