This article is dedicated to the memory of muralist José Clemente Orozco. The author, Antonio Rodríguez, describes one of the painter’s most grounded obsessions with regard to his artistic practice: the search for light, and the possibility of finding it and expressing it in his works, whether on murals or easels. This art critic, however, acknowledges that in the twilight of the painter’s life his obsession was transformed into a search for physical, radiant, optical light. In his studio Orozco carried out this quest by trying to find light and manage it from different perspectives. Through his description of the muralist’s house-studio in Guadalajara, Rodríguez explains the way in which Orozco himself organized, built, and decided upon the physical spaces of the room. After the painter died in 1949, the studio was converted into a museum through the initiative of his wife, Margarita Valladares de Orozco, and with the aid of the government of Jalisco and the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes [INBA, National Institute of Fine Arts]. The museum’s inauguration was the occasion for the publication of this article, which applauded the museographical work of Fernando Gamboa in coordination with the artist’s daughter, Lucrecia Orozco. Finally, Rodríguez recognizes that the house-studio (which was the repository of Orozco’s pictorial dreams, and which contains early sketches and drafts of important works) is absolutely imbued with the artist’s extraordinary personality.
