Chapingo Autonomous University. Universidad Autonoma Chapingo is an agricultural college located in Texcoco, Mexico State in Mexico. The university is a federally funded public institution of higher education. It offers technical and full bachelor's degrees as well as having scientific and technological research programs. Many of these programs are related to agriculture, forestry and fishing. The school began as the Escuela Nacional de Agricultura which was founded in 1854 at the Monastery of San Jacinto in Mexico City. The school was moved in 1923 to the President Álvaro Obregón ex Hacienda of Chapingo. Postgraduate studies were added in 1959. The school received autonomous status in 1978. It offers courses of study in Forestry, Agricultural Economics, Agricultural Industries, Irrigation, Rural Sociology and more. The main attraction for visitors at this school is its murals, especially those in the Chapel of the Chapingo Autonomous University by Diego Rivera. The room was old hacienda chapel, but is now the University Ceremonies Room. This work was begun in 1924 and completed in 1927. Rivera painted 41 separate panels that cover the walls and ceiling of the room. The murals contain imagery relating to the revolutionary struggles of the peasants and working class of Mexico and the fertility and cycles of nature. Covering an area of over 700m 2, the work divides into three parts. The left panels depict man's struggle to have land, the right panels show the evolution of Mother Nature and the center shows the communion between man and earth. The most prominent panel at the front of the room is titled Tierra Fecunda and features a nude woman reclining in a landscape accompanied by the personifications of the natural forces of wind, water, and fire. Three smaller figures represent humanity who have created machines to harness natural energy. The murals on the south wall continue the theme of nature, showing cycles of germination, growth, and flowering. The murals on the north wall are devoted to images of revolution, suggesting that revolution follows similar natural cycles of germination, growth, and fruition. On both sides, Rivera included images of death, buried seeds and buried revolutionary martyrs. It is considered to be one of Rivera's best works. More recently, the school acquired an unnamed mural by Luis Nishizawa. This work was produced during his last year at the Escuela Nacional de Artes Plasticas of UNAM and depicts the agriculture of Mexico in both the past and the present. The work is six meters high, nine meters wide and in the form of a triangle. It is placed in a building that is commonly called El Partenon. The school is also home to the National Museum of Agriculture. The 2,000 m 2 facility presents the development of agriculture in Mexico from the pre-Hispanic past to the present day. The collection has about 4,000 objects relating to technology, agronomy including farming implements and photographs by Hanz Gutmann. The Chapingo Autonomous University offers a wide variety of agricultural focused undergraduate degrees to be completed in four years such as Statistics, Economics, Agri-foods Networks, Horticulture, Business and Administration, and International Trade. This offer also includes a list of engineering programs such as Forestry, Agricultural Irrigation, Agricultural Industry, Agricultural Ecology, Agricultural Mechanics, Forestry Industry, Forestry Restoration, Renewable Natural Resources, Plant Science, Soil Agronomics, Animal Science, Tropical Zones, Rural Sociology, Agricultural Economics, Agricultural Parasitology, Agri-food Industry and Agroforestry Development. It also offers high school education: the Agricultural High School takes three years to finish.For students entering the university who already have a high school education, a one-year Propedeutic course is mandatory.
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