The Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura (INBAL, Spanish: National Institute of Fine Arts and Literature), located in the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City, is the national Mexican institute of fine arts and literature, founded on December 31, 1946. It is also called Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes (INBA).
On November 23, 1946, president Miguel Alemán proposed the creation of the INBA, and it was formally opened on 1 January 1947, as a branch of the Secretaría de Educación Pública (SEP). The first head of the INBA was Carlos Chávez, who created a new orchestra for the Conservatory, the current Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional.
The institute includes many departments, artistic ensembles, three national centers for storage of the literary stock, 29 schools and further institutions. The school of design and handicafts was founded by José Chávez Morado in 1962.
The institute provides education through elementary school to postgrad; one of the educational institutions that INBAL manages is CEDARTS ( centros de educación artística or artistic education centers, in English) which is focused on the artistic education on its basis.
There are 12 CEDARTS on Mexico, 3 on Mexico city and the rest on some other states.
Alongside to the educational offer, there are some museums, galleries and buildings under the INBAL management, that the institute often use to present different types of artistic entretainment to general public, such as "tempestad" or season of flamenco dance.