Siqueiros, Leopoldo Méndez and some with text by Octavio Paz. Its first director was Susana Gamboa and its first exhibition was of paintings by Feliciano Peña, one of the first artists to break from the Mexican muralist school of painting. This was shortly followed by exhibitions of works by Celia Calderón and Fernando Castro Pacheco. Its original rules were strict with the aim of quality control, with pieces submitted judged by a panel with included the head of the Departamento de Artes Plásticas, the directors of the Escuela de Pintura y Escultura and the Escuela Nacional de Artes Plásticas the president of the Asociación de Críticos e Investigadores de las Artes Plásticas and the director of the Salón itself.(historia) In its first three years, sales surpassed a half a million pesos, with the main beneficiaries being Rufino Tamayo, Luis Nishizawa, Guillermo Meza, Carlos Orozco Romero, Raúl Anguiano, Ignacio Beteta, José Chávez Morado, Juan Soriano, Juan O'Gorman, Olga Costa, Federico Cantú, Gustavo Montoya and Fanny Rabel. Two notable painter who did not have success here were Alberto Beltrán and Leopoldo Méndez. Some of the first works to be collected by the Salón include El abrazo de Amor by Frida Kahlo, El pescador by Alfredo Zalce, El pintor by Agustín Lazo and La niña con vestido a cuadros by Gustavo Montoya. In the 1970s, there were rivalries, new generations of artists challenging the old and a competitive art market, which forced the institution to reorganize. It also opened a second site in Colonia Roma. In 2009, for its 60th anniversary, the Salón reorganized again, as Cecilia Santacruz indicated that it had ceased to be the main indicator of the Mexican art scene and needed to be made over. She also added that it was not longer as open to new artists and markets as it used to be, rather a forum for promotion and publicity. The reorganization included the integration of new technologies for promotion and the unification of catalog design. References Contemporary art galleries in Mexico Art museums and galleries in Mexico Museums in Mexico City Art museums established in 1949 1949 establishments in Mexico Colonia Roma