The Trotsky Museum

(Museo Casa de León Trotsky, Coyoacán, México)

Trotsky in Coyoacán. Photo by Alex Buchman. Courtesy of the Museo Casa de León Trotsky.

In this section of TrotskyanaNet we present three major contributions about the famous Trotsky house (nowadays forming part of the Trotsky Museum (Museo Casa de León Trotsky) in Coyoacán, México, where Leon Trotsky spent the last sixteen months of his life together with his companion Nataliia Sedova, his grandson Vsevolod Platonovich Volkov and several secretaries and guards:

• The Trotsky Museum (Museo Casa de León Trotsky) in Coyoacán, an exhaustive essay, presented both in Spanish with title El Museo Casa León Trotsky: pasado y presente, and in English with title Trotsky Museum: past and present, authored by Prof. Gabriel García Higueras.
  It is based on first-hand research in Coyoacán, done in 1990 and 2006. This essay, written in 2006/07, features many aspects of the history of the Trotsky house in Coyoacán and of the everyday life of those who lived there in 1939/40.
  At the same time it features today’s Trotsky Museum which Trotsky’s  house several years ago has become a part of.
   
• Trotsky in Coyoacán - a bibliography, an exhaustive  bibliographical compilation of published items about Trotsky’s final years of exile in Mexico, about his assassination, and about the house in Coyoacán which he acquired in 1939 and in which he was murdered in August 1940 by Stalinist agent Ramón Mercader. This bibliography is an ongoing project.
   
• Picture galleries of The Trotsky Museum (Coyoacán, México): 64 photographs taken by Gabriel García Higueras in August 2006, presented as
• slide show
• photo album

Description of the photographs presented
in the Coyoacán photo album and slide show

Photo no. Short description 1 - 6 Exterior views of the Trotsky House and Museum in Coyoacán (Calle Viena 10, Av. Rio Churubusco 410)   1 Part of exterior facade with plate “Calle Viena”   2 Part of exterior facade, at the corner of Calle Viena and Av. Morelos   3 Another part of the exterior facade   4 Watchtower as seen from Av. Rio Churubusco   5 Iron gate at Calle Viena 33 (former entrance to the house)   6 Plate at the exterior facade, indicating that Leon Trotsky once lived in that house and that it is now forming part of the Trotsky Museum (entrance via Av. Rio Churubusco 410)   7 Gate to the Trotsky Museum (new building) 8 - 25 Interior views of the Trotsky Museum (new building)   8 Part of the Museum’s library; sitting in front: Esteban Volkov, Trotsky’s grandson   9-10 Part of the Museum’s library   12-25 Photographs from the exhibition rooms (temporary exhibitions of artists and permanent exhibition of photographs, posters, documents and artefacts related to Trotsky’s life and work), inter alia:   14 Trotsky bust sculpted by Duncan P. Ferguson (1943)   19 Trotsky’s Red Army cap   25 Passage from the Museum (new building) to the garden of the old House 26 Sitemap with suggested route for visitors 27 - 37 The garden, inner court and interior facades of Trotsky’s House   30-31 The rabbit hutches   32-33 The gravestone and urn grave of Leon Trotsky and Natalia Sedova   34 The inscription on gravestone   35 Facade and entrance of Esteban Volkov’s sleeping room   36 The guards’ house   37 Plaque in memory of R.S. Harte (guard), murdered May 1940 38-63 Interior views of Trotsky’s House   38-39 Impressions from Trotsky’s study and office   40 Reproduction of Trotsky bust sculpted by Claire Sheridan (1920)   41 Trotsky’s dictaphone   42 Trotsky’s desk   43 Trotsky’s glasses [presented in exhibition room]   44 Part of Trotsky’s library   45 The chaise longue on which Trotsky used to have a siesta [in the study/office]   46 Drawing by V. Kibalchich [this and other works about Trotsky by the Russian-Mexican artist were presented in an exhibition of the Trotsky Museum in 2006]   47-50 The sleeping room of Leon Trotsky and Natalia Sedova. Photo no. 48: Bullet holes after the 24 May 1940 raid at Trotsky’s House   51 Bedroom of Trotsky’s grandson Esteban Volkov (aged 14 at the time of Trotsky’s assassination)   52-54 The bathroom   55-56 The kitchen   57-59 The dining room   60-63 The office. Photo no. 62: Natalia Sedova’s desk in the office 64 Gabriel García Higueras, who made the photographs presented here, in the Trotsky Museum (August 2006)

Rev. June 2007

© by Wolfgang & Petra Lubitz 2004 — http://www.trotskyana.net