Looming above the passenger platforms within the Copilco metro station are gigantic images that depict a Kaleidoscopic “time traveler’s” vision of human history. 

The mural, which consists of five large panels, is entitled “El Perfil del Tiempo” (“The Profile of Time”). It was created by the artist Guillermo Cenicero in 1999 as part of a powerful series of artwork he produced for several Mexico City subway stations. 

Images of the prehistory of the Old World such as the cave paintings of Lascaux and Altamira and the great civilizations of the Ancient Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians, the Ancient Han Chinese, and Indus Valley are juxtaposed with those of the New World such as the Meso-American Aztec, Olmec, Mayan, and the Moche and Incan of the Andes. 

Here, too, are renditions of the famous masterpieces next to their creators, such as Pablo Picasso and “Guernica,” a scene of “The Garden of Earthly Delights” and Hieronymous Bosch, and Leonardo Da Vinci and “The Mona Lisa.”

Cenicero has stated that the main purpose of this enigmatic public artwork is to allow passengers traveling on or waiting for the train the opportunity to contemplate and appreciate both the passing of time and the rich global history of humanity as a species that has led up to the present moment.