Museo Nacional de la Mascara – A Unique Mask Museum

Source: SAHER [CC BY-SA 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], from Wikimedia Commons

The museum is also known as the National Mask Museum located in the city of San Luis Potosi has been set from the pre-Hispanic time. The museum stirs and keeps the popular masked dance and ritual heritage of Mexico alive with a display of around 1,300 unique permanent collections of objects comprising Mexican masks, historic objects, and costumes used in dance forms. The museum building was entitled as federal property in the year 1907 which was earlier a mansion located along Plaza del Carmen. The Neoclassical influenced architecture of the museum was built by Enrique Campos for Ramon Marti in the year 1890s and gradually became federal property.

The museum architecture has been changed and redesigned many times, and in 1982 it was restructured first time by eminent architect Fernando Valdez Lozano. The historic building that was once mansion was established as a museum in 1982. The museum currently houses the largest collection of masks along with nearly 25 types of full dance costumes collected from across the country. The museum gradually increased in size with the initial collection donated by anthropologist Victor Jose Moya Rubio and Mildred Dingleberry Himm. The masks are special for they are handcrafted and has important cultural and iconic value.

The masks and objects in the museum display a strong ethical significance representing animals, demons, angels, mythical creatures, saints, etc. A large number of masks are even from India and other parts of the world. The museum has six exhibition halls with two major halls dedicated to displaying pre-Hispanic masks and a number of masks from the colonial period. The rest of the halls have temporary exhibits and objects. The museum has been renovated and remodeled a number of times with the collection of masks and other exhibition objects updated.

The museum is located opposite the Teatro de la Paz and hence is a very convenient location with frequent reconstruction and designing. The building was restored twice first in the year in 1981 and next in 2004. Some of the important collection is El Tlahualil from the Michoacan and the significant “Centurion” mask that is from the state of Guerrero. The operating hours for the museum is 10 am to 3 pm on Sunday and Monday, from 10 am to 6 pm from Tuesday to Friday and from 10 am to 5 pm on Saturday. The entrance cost is $10 for adults and $10 for students and an additional $10 for a camera.

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