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THE MEXICAN CULTURAL
INSTITUTE OF NEW YORK
Annual Report 2008
Honorary President
Ambassador Rubén Beltrán
Consul General of Mexico in New York
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Board & Staff……………………………………….....
Introduction & Mission…...……………………….
Visual Arts…………………………………………........
Film…………………………………………………............
Performing Arts & Music………………………...
Board of Directors
Advisory Board
Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Gaetana Enders
Dore Ashton
Vartan Gregorian
Miguel Cervantes
Patricia Espinosa
Minister of Foreign Affairs
Jorge Mariscal
Judith Friedlander
Liliana Melo de Sada
Juan García de Oteyza
Enrique Norten
Manolo García Oliva
Adolfo Patrón
Ronald Hellman
Luis Peña
Isabella Hutchinson
Yolanda Santos
Mary-Anne Martin
Kenneth Schwartz
Zarela Martínez
Denise Simon
Brian Nissen
Susan Segal
Richard Peña
Alan Stoga
Treasurer
Edward Sullivan
Eduardo Ramos Gómez
Joel Thome
Alberto Fierro
Director General of Educational
and Cultural Cooperation
The Mexican Cultural Institute
Raúl J. Zorrilla
Executive Director
Jill Vexler
Traditional & Special Events……………...........
Eliot Weinberger Secretary
Media & Press……………………………………........
Alejandro Estivill
General Director for North America
Pepita Serrano
Literature……………………………………………......
Research & Academic Projects………………
Arturo Sarukhan
Ambassador of Mexico to the United States
Maria Elena Cabezut
Deputy Director
Kevin Dyer
Aldo Sánchez
Program Coordinator
Institutional Support & Collaboration……...
Financial Information .……………………………..
Emeritus Board
Plácido Arango
Carolina Ferreras
Program Associate & Administrative Liaison
Rita DiMartino
Plácido Domingo
Henry Kissinger
Elda Díaz Briseño
Program Coordinator Intern
William Luers
Thomas E. McNamara
William Rhodes
David Rockefeller
Rodman Rockefeller
José F. Serrano
Carlos Slim
Rafael Tovar y de Teresa
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As Honorary President of the Mexican Cultural Institute of New York, I am pleased to present for the first time during my
The Mexican Cultural Institute is committed to creating awareness of the rich, vibrant and diverse cultural heritage
term the report of the cultural activities of the Institute during 2008.
of Mexico as a democratic, pluralistic and creative nation. Through art exhibitions, performances, film screenings,
panel discussions, readings, book presentations and other activities, the Institute seeks to connect with the New York
I would start by saying that I am convinced that in order to promote a mutual understanding between nations and its
community and enrich its cultural scene.
citizens it is fundamental that the exchange of ideas, information, forms of expression and other cultural aspects take
place. I consider the cultural arena to be an ideal space to present those aspects of Mexico’s society and culture that
As you will note in the following pages, during the year the Institute organized and participated actively in more than
contribute to eradicate prejudices and showcase the qualities and the merits of the nation of Mexico.
60 cultural programs. These included twenty-four events of visual arts, nine about film, ten musical presentations, nine
related to literature, three dance/theater performances, along with numerous special events showcasing Mexican
It was with this objective that the Mexican Cultural Institute of New York was created. I am proud to inform you that
culture.
2008 represents a new stage in its development. With a new team and a renewed spirit, the Institute embarked on the
task of once more establishing itself in the cultural agenda of this city. I can assert you with great satisfaction that we
This year the Institute reached out to collaborate with prestigious organizations and institutions in New York to offer
are on the way to fulfilling this mission.
a wide variety of cultural activities. These included Americas Society, New York University and it’s King Juan Carlos
Center, CUNY, the Y Gallery, the New Museum of Contemporary Art, the Hispanic Society of America, the Queens
As you will see in the upcoming pages, in 2008 the Institute participated in almost a hundred cultural activities in the
Theatre in the Park and the Cervantes Institute among many others.
fields of literature, visual arts, music, theater, dance, investigation and the promotion of our traditions.
The Institute was actively involved with numerous festivals. These included the Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors Festival,
I want to express our gratitude to all the New York institutions that allow us to jointly participate in many of the
where Mexican artist Francisco Hernández participated in La Casita: A Home for the Heart; the New York Festival of
programmed activities. I also want to acknowledge the support given by the following Mexican institutions: General
International Literature/PEN World Voices, the NY Film Festival, the Celebrate Mexico, Latin Beat, Celebrate Brooklyn,
Office of Cultural and Educational Cooperation of the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs (DGCEC), the National Council
the Central Park Summer stage and the Association of Performing Arts Presenters (APAP).
for the Arts and Culture (CNCA), the National Fund for Culture and Arts (FONCA), ProMexico and the Mexico Tourism
Board.
A concrete example of the Institute’s new agenda is its involvement with a variety of joint projects with the New
Museum of Contemporary Art. Three gallery exhibitions took place during this year: Unmonumental: The Object
Finally, I want to especially thank the members of the Board of Directors for their ongoing support during the past
in the 21st Century, Tlatelolco and the Localized Negotiation as part of the Museum as Hub project and Double Album
seventeen years since the founding of the Institute.
featuring Mexican artist Daniel Guzmán.
Cultural promotion has always occupied an important place in Mexican foreign affairs. A good portion of Mexico’s
In the area of literature, the Institute organized a Tribute to Carlos Fuentes presented at the Metropolitan Museum of
international reputation and prestige has been built on a unique strength: its cultural vitality and diversity. In an
Art on the occasion of his 80th birthday. This was the first public tribute celebrating the Mexican author. More than 800
increasingly interconnected world, culture will continue being Mexico’s best letter of introduction. New York, in many
people attended the event. Fuentes presented a lecture on The Bicentennial of the Latin American Independences.
senses, is a box of universal resonance. With this in mind, I invite you to continue collaborating with us so that the
Institute may reach the objectives it has set out to accomplish in this city.
Another important event was a Tribute to Octavio Paz in the King Juan Carlos Center, which commemorated the 10th
anniversary of his death. It is worth mentioning the long term relationship with CUNY University to bring a number of
Mexican writers each year to participate in the Reading/Writing Mexico Series. Also very important was the Institute’s
involvement in the organization of the Aura Estrada Prize that was announced by Nobel Prize Gabriel García Márquez
during the Guadalajara Book Fair.
Amb. Rubén Beltrán
Consul General of Mexico
Honorary President of the Mexican Cultural Institute of New York
The Institute is committed to helping provide new opportunities to the Mexican film industry. This year the Institute
co-organized the first Mexican film festival in NY Hola Mexico! where 13 Mexican films were screened. In addition,
the Institute organized film screenings with the Film Society of Lincoln Center, the 92 Y Tribeca and the Cervantes
Institute.
All of us at the Mexican Cultural Institute will continue to work hard to develop events that showcase the uniqueness
of Mexico’s art and culture. We look forward to another exciting year full of events. We invite you to join us and help us
accomplish our mission to expand our reach in the cultural life of New York.
Raúl J. Zorrilla
Executive Director
The Mexican Cultural Institute of New York
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MISSION OF THE INSTITUTE
The mission of The Mexican Cultural Institute of New York is to strengthen the image of Mexico and foster a better
understanding of our country through the promotion of its art and culture.
Our objectives include making sure that our activities have a high and lasting impact among all the
multiethnic and multicultural communities in the New York City area. In addition, the Institute aims to generate
interest among the Mexican communities in the Tri-State region by presenting Mexico’s most relevant artistic
expressions ranging from the Pre-Columbian period to contemporary art.
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VISUAL ARTS
UNMONUMENTAL:
THE OBJECT IN THE 21ST CENTURY
December 1, 2007 – April 6, 2008. New Museum of Contemporary Art
Organized by the New Museum’s curatorial team of Richard Flood, Laura Hoptman and Massimiliano Gioni,
Unmonumental: The Object In The 21st Century included the participation of 30 artists whose work was composed
of found materials, often appearing as if they had been created in basements and garages rather than in traditional
ateliers. Fabrication, scale, and permanence have given way to that which is intimate, provisional, domestic and
otherwise overlooked confirming in the words of the curators: “the times demand an anti-masterpiece”.
Although they use varied strategies and materials, each of the artists in this portion of Unmonumental exploits the
formal and ideological power of juxtaposing found images to create works that range from social and political
commentaries to surrealist fantasies and personal confessions. Mexican participating artists included Abraham
Cruzvillegas, Gabriel Kuri and Jonathan Hernández.
The Institute supported the exhibition through the shipping of the work as well as the transportation of the Mexican
Jonathan Hernández
Mural, 2006
Forty-seven posters with tracings from David
Alfaro Siqueiros mural sketch, thirteen panels
La Colección Jumex, Mexico
“Rarely, in today’s New York, does a building project
inspire so much confidence in the future.”
- Nicolai Ouroussoff, The New York Times
Photos by Alison Brady, courtesy of the New Museum
artists.
Abraham Cruzvillegas
Canon enigmático a 108 voces, 2005
Buoys, fine wire, steel wire, and
synthetic and natural fibers
The Speyer Family Collection, New York
Gabriel Kuri
Untitled, 2006
Two metallic garbage cans and plastic plant
Courtesy the artist, Galleria Franco Noero,
Turin and kurimanzutto, Mexico City
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TORRIJOS: THE MAN AND THE MYTH
DIALOGUE BETWEEN GRACIELA ITURBIDE AND
CUAUHTÉMOC MEDINA February 28. Americas Society
Torrijos: The Man and the Myth was a unique exhibition shown at Americas Society from January through May 2008
of never-before-published photographs of former Panamanian leader Omar Torrijos by Graciela Iturbide - one of
Mexico’s most celebrated photographers. Omar Torrijos was Panama’s most famous leader (from 1968 to 1981) and
is one of the best-known twentieth century figures throughout Latin America.
Americas Society and the Institute co-organized this well-attended conversation between the photographer and the
curator to discuss the interesting series. The audience had the opportunity to ask Iturbide questions about the project
and the social and political circumstances of that time.
Graciela Iturbide is internationally recognized for her iconic images of Mexico and was awarded with the Hasselblad
photography prize in 2008. The artist discussed her work with Cuauhtémoc Medina, a Mexico City-based critic and art
historian, and Associated Curator of Latin American art at the Tate Modern, London.
Graciela Iturbide
General Torrijos on one of his visits to the
countryside of Panama, 1975
Courtesy of the artist
Graciela Iturbide
General Torrijos on one of his visits to the
countryside of Panama, 1975
Courtesy of the artist
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TLATELOLCO AND THE LOCALIZED NEGOTIATION
OF FUTURE IMAGINARIES: MUSEO TAMAYO AT THE
NEW MUSEUM February 27 – April 27. New Museum
This project organized by Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo for the Museum as Hub program of the New Museum,
addressed the topic of Taltelolco as a neighborhood. For Museo Tamayo curators Tobias Ostrander and Jorge Murguía,
the neighborhood or barrio is a multifaceted, fluctuating structure that contains within it not only a particular identification
with a site, but also with a set of human relationships, ideals, and visions about what a particular space is and can possibly
become. This collective identification can be understood to represent shared desire or desires, and as such the projection
of a future imaginary or potentiality. Filled with the aspirations and anxieties of cultural development, Tlatelolco has been
a significant cultural site since the Aztec period. In the twentieth century, it was closely identified with the modernist urban
planning ambitions of Mexico in the early 1960s, and student demonstrations and killings during the 1968 Olympics. As a
result of the 1985 earthquake, Tlatelolco suffered dramatic casualties and fatalities, as its architecture proved unsound.
A site rich in the complex layering of constructed histories that define contemporary Mexico, Tlatelolco represents the
construction of future possibilities for the nation as it looks to define its place within an increasingly globalized world.
In this project, Tatiana Bilbao, Christoph Draeger, Thomas Glassford, Terence Gower, Paulina Lasa, Mark Powell, and
Pedro Reyes presented new and existing works that addressed Tlatelolco as a repeated site of imaginings of the future
and various collective ideals and relationships. Film screenings, artist talks and workshops, discussions with cultural
critics, and informal discussion groups took place over the course of the presentation. Discussions between artist
Terence Gower and curator/writer Ana Elena Mallet, artist Pedro Reyes and architect Jose Castillo, artist Paulina Lasa
and art historian/curator Cuauhtémoc Medina took place in the New Museum theater, and a screening of Fernando
Eimbcke’s Temporada de patos was programmed at the Anthology Film Archives. The exhibition and informal conversations hosted by Hub Fellows on March 8 and 22, and April 19 were presented in the dedicated Museum as Hub
space on the 5th floor of the Museum.
A partnership of five international arts organizations, Museum as Hub is a new model for curatorial practice and
institutional collaboration established to enhance our understanding of contemporary art. Both a network of relationships and an actual physical site located in the New Museum Education Center, Museum as Hub was conceived as
a flexible, social space designed to engage audiences through multimedia workstations, exhibition areas, screenings,
Works by (clockwise)
Pedro Reyes, Christoph Draeger and Tatiana Bilbao
symposia, and events. Initiated by the New Museum in 2006, the partnership included Insa Art Space (Seoul, South
Korea); Museo Tamayo Arte Contemporáneo (Mexico City, Mexico); Townhouse Gallery of Contemporary Art (Cairo,
Photos by Alison Brady, courtesy of the New Museum
Egypt); and Van Abbemuseum (Eindhoven, the Netherlands).
The Institute hosted the inaugural reception and supported the screening of Temporada de patos, as described in the
upcoming film section.
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CUAUHTÉMOC MEDINA
LECTURE ON FRANCIS ALŸS
March 1. The Hispanic Society of America
This lecture was planned as an initiative of the Institute in conjunction with the Francis Alÿs Fabiola project organized by
Dia Art Foundation at The Hispanic Society of America through April 2008.
Over the last two decades, Francis Alÿs has assembled a significant collection of nearly identical paintings and other
reproductions of fourth-century Saint Fabiola, all based on a now-lost original painted in the nineteenth century by the
French artist Jean-Jacques Henner.
This obscure work has been assiduously copied by amateurs and professionals alike and has become a popular icon,
a phenomenon that, as the artist stated, “indicated a different criterion of what a masterwork could be.”
The exhibition of these images at the Hispanic Society comprised for the first time Alÿs’ complete group of almost three
hundred Fabiola portraits.
The exhibition was accompanied by a series of public programs including lectures, panel discussions, and gallery talks,
as well as special educational initiatives that draw on the relationship between the contemporary project and the Hispanic Society’s permanent collection.
A hardcover book was published that included background material on Saint Fabiola, as well as essays by art historians,
theological historians, and Dia Curator Lynne Cooke. The publication also catalogued each Fabiola, including detailed
descriptions and photographs, many in full-color.
Cuauhtémoc Medina has curated several exhibitions and projects by Francis Alÿs such as Walking Distance from The
Studio at the Colegio de San Ildefonso Museum in Mexico City and When Faith Moves Mountain at the Lima Biennial.
Installation view at the Hispanic Society
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Installation view at the Hispanic Society
A FINE FIGURE CONTEMPORARY MEXICAN
AND LATIN AMERICAN ART
March 11 – April 17. Susan Eley Fine Art
LABORATORIO 060
March 13, 2008 – April 19. CUE Art Foundation
Curated by Suzanne Schachter and Antonio Arelle, founders of the International
Cultural Exchange and promoted by the Institute, A Fine Figure was presented as the
second survey of contemporary Mexican and Latin American Art. The show included
Curated by Pablo Helguera and co-sponsored by the Institute, Laboratorio 060 is a selection of work by the Mexico
nearly 30 works.
City-based curatorial collective by the same name. Their work blurs the line between the processes of curating and
art-making through elements of art history, humor and contemporary social commentary. Since coming together in
2003 as part of a seminar on curatorial practice in Mexico City, Laboratorio 060 has brought their varied projects to
traditionally peripheral audiences through inclusion, not just presentation, “creating new communities within the
BRONX BLUE BEDROOM PROJECT (BBBP)
March 1 – December 29
Mott Haven, Bronx
relational sphere of art.”
Underlining the participatory and sometimes confrontational nature of Laboratorio 060’s work, its members, Lourdes
Morales, Javier Toscano and Daniela Wolf, use terms such as “curatorial actions” and “interventions” to describe many
Bronx Blue Bedroom Project (BBBP) is an ongoing artist-run project located in the
bedroom of artist Blanka Amezkua in Mott Haven, South Bronx. Artists had the
opportunity to participate in BBBP for the duration of one month. Artists were also
asked to commit to offering a workshop to the local community and prepare a dinner
to be shared with other artists and individuals interested in the arts during their show.
Courtesy of Blanka Amezkua
of their projects.
Ruben’s Venus (winner), 2005
From the project, Looking for Venus
2008 Artists included:
Blanka Amezkua / Emecee C.M. / Matthew Burcaw / Gabriela Alva Cal y Mayor
Melissa A. Calderon / Jorge Rojas / Agata Olek / Jessica Lagunas
Since its inception, the Institute has supported this project through promotion and
economic contribution.
PAINTED WALLS OF MEXICO
Book signing
June 24. The Century Association
Somewhere between a scholarly investigation and a travel book, Painted Walls of
Mexico documents commercial and decorative wall paintings in public and private
buildings in the city of Xalapa and the town of Coatepec in the state of Veracruz,
Mexico. As Homero Aridjis writes in the preface, “Painted Walls is not only an invaluable
testimony to this undervalued art which is disappearing from our streets, but honors
the unknown artists who, with humor and imagination but without the slightest recognition, convert the streets of their town into an open gallery.”
Traffic, curatorial action, 2004
Video still: “The solemnity of a ritual and
the seduction of a spectacle”,
Octavio Paz, 1994, refering to the movement
of the ejercito Zapatista de Liberación Nacional (EZLN)
Authors Phyllis La Farge and Magdalena Caris signed copies of the book at the
reception at the Century Association.
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DOUBLE ALBUM:
DANIEL GUZMÁN AND STEVEN SHEARER
April 23 – July 6. New Museum of Contemporary Art
Double Album brought together two artists - Daniel Guzmán (born 1964, lives and works in Mexico City, Mexico) and
Steven Shearer (born 1968, lives and works in Vancouver, BC, Canada). Both artists work in a variety of mediums
exploring issues of male identity, extended adolescence, rock culture, death, and the seductive ambiguity of selfportraiture. Experiencing their work, one immediately sees a parallel adoption of 1970s and 1980s pop icons and bands
as surrogates and personal avatars.
Daniel Guzmán draws. His work is a tidal wave of drawing that also becomes a dynamic inventory of drawing styles. His
myriad influences range from Aztec codices, Haight-Ashbury psychedelia, comic books from his youth, and Mexican
muralists, particularly José Clemente Orozco. The topics of Guzmán’s drawings fuse old gods with current events,
cultural idols, inventories of deadly sins, and cardinal virtues.
Guzmán’s sculpture is a natural extension of his drawing techniques. He uses the simplest of materials to sketch a
three-dimensional incident and establish encounters with the magic realism of the everyday. In much of his work there
are two levels of interpretation - what it is (the sum of its parts) and what it signifies (the poetry of its allusions).
While it is impossible to think of Guzmán’s art outside of the context of Mexico, it is equally impossible to ignore the
wider cultural context provided by the United States and the world beyond. It is the ease of his citations (be it William
Burroughs or Roberto Bolaño, Bruce Nauman or Kiss) that creates a floating universe of sublimely mismatched
equivalencies.
The Institute supported Double Album by providing Guzmán’s transportation to both the installation and opening night
of the show (attended by over 1,000 people) as well as shipment of the work exhibited.
Daniel Guzmán
Qué extraordinario que el mundo exista,
Mexico, 1997.
Plastic bucket and three digital prints
as photographic documentation.
40x30 cm.
Exhibition view
at the New Museum
Daniel Guzmán
Untitled, from “The Secret History
of Rock” series, 2003.
Ink on paper, 47x32 cm.
Daniel Guzmán
P.P.P. Levitation, from “The World
Doesn’t Want Me Anymore and
Doesn’t Know It” series, 2006.
Acrylic on wood, 50x40x2.5 cm.
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RESIDENCY PROGRAM FOR MEXICAN ARTISTS
April - July / August - November
International Studio and Curatorial Program
(FONCA) and the Mexican Cultural Institute. Every year through an open call, a changing committee composed by art
experts select two artists that will participate for a period of four months each at the ISCP residency program in New
York City.
Artists are provided with round-trip transportation, a studio at ISCP, accommodation at an apartment in Williamsburg,
Courtesy of the artist
This artist in residence program is a result of a collaboration between the National Fund for the Culture and the Arts
Cuauhtémoc Buda, Joaquín Segura (Mexico City, 1980). May 9 – 12.
Brooklyn as well as a stipend for materials and living expenses.
In 2008, the two selected artists were Joaquín Segura and Rolando Flores (member of collective Tercerunquinto).
Thanks to this New York residency, Segura was invited to participate at In Transit, a group exhibition at the Moti Hasson
Gallery, and Flores participated in a lecture about Tercerunquinto at Americas Society along with other members of the
collective.
OPEN STUDIOS
ISCP hosts Open Studios twice a year to give the public, art professionals and art enthusiasts access to the program´s
artists and curators from around the world. The Open Studios weekend presents recent artworks and projects by the
participants in the residency program, providing an exclusive peek of the production, process, and personal archive of
27 artists from about 20 countries.
About the artists:
Joaquín Segura (Mexico City, 1980).
Visual artist, who lives and works in Mexico City. His action, installation, intervention and photographic work has been
shown in solo and group exhibitions in Mexico, USA and Europe.
Rolando Flores (Mexico City, 1975).
Member of Tercerunquinto collective formed along with Julio Castro and Gabriel Cázares that jointly manipulates
architectural elements to change the spatial dynamics of interior and exterior spaces in order to examine their limits
and alter their functions.
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Appointments, Rolando Flores (Mexico City, 1975). November 7 - 10.
SANTIAGO MATAMOROS
México, 1575 - 1600. Gallery talk
CONSTRUCTION OF CULTURES
SOLO SHOW BY DIEGO MEDINA
Lecture by Dr Patrick Lenaghan, Curator of Prints and Photographs and Helen Fontoira, Conservator on the
This exhibition culminated Diego Medina’s year-long artist residency at the Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning.
May 29 – July 30. Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning
May 17. The Hispanic Society of America
16th-century Mexican sculptural relief that depicts Santiago Matamoros (St. James the Moorslayer).
Medina’s work is based on his belief that art transforms relationships between people, communities, and spaces.
According to Spanish legend, Santiago Matamoros appeared at the battle of Clavijo, where he led the Christian
His performative, socio-political art—which encompasses sculpture, installation, drawing, and community action—
forces to victory over the Moorish invaders. Carved for a large altar which no longer exists, the work offers a rare and
examines the mutation and proliferation of Mexican culture. Medina’s work explores themes of life and death, drawing
fascinating glimpse into Mexican art of this time. Moreover, because so little sculpture survives from this date, it is
a parallel between the process of cultural evolution and the process of creating art. Central to Construction of Cultures’
particularly noteworthy. As the Spanish settled in the New World, the Catholic church embarked on an ambitious
sculptures and installation art is the transformative use of found everyday objects.
program of church building and decoration, and this relief corresponds to this activity. Probably executed by a nativeborn artist who had received training in European styles, the relief reflects a mix of visual conventions as local artists
The exhibition was partially funded by the Institute.
assimilated Spanish traditions.
Conservation treatment on this recent acquisition was completed. Using traditional techniques and modern methods,
Hispanic Society conservators returned the piece as much as possible to its original condition. Consequently, the relief
once more affords impressive proof of the sculptor’s talent and the sculptural riches found in 16th-century Mexico.
The Institute, in its second collaboration with The Hispanic Society, hosted a reception following the lecture.
Installation view at Jamaica Center.
Polychrome and gilded
wood relief.
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OPERATIVO
SOLO SHOW BY TERESA MARGOLLES
May 29 – July 30. Y Gallery
Y Gallery, in collaboration with the Mexican Cultural Institute, presented Operativo, the first solo exhibition in New York
by Teresa Margolles. The show was curated by Cecilia Jurado.
Margolles was born in Culiacán, Mexico, where drug related violence is an every day battle. Since her early work with
collective SEMEFO (Forensic Medical Service), and later as a solo artist, Margolles has addressed anonymous death
by collecting, reusing, and manipulating objects and procedures from the morgue in Mexico City. For this exhibition
Margolles presented work focusing on current relations between her native country and the United States.
The work in the exhibition alludes to the operativo Novolato, a Mexican federal force in charge of fighting drug trafficking that has produced a reverted effect and incremented levels of violence. The phrase For those who don´t believe it,
motherfuckers was engraved on the gallery wall and refers to a message found on a dead body in Ecatepec, Estado
de México, a victim of drug related violence while Blood Painting was created by soaking a canvas with the blood left
on the street after another drug related murder in Culiacán.
Teresa Margolles (based in Mexico City) earned degrees in Forensic Medicine and Science of Communication at
Universidad Nacional de Mexico. Her work has been shown internationally at institutions such as P.S.1/MoMa in New
York, the Kunst-Werke Berlin, Kunsthalle Wien, The Museum of Modern Art of Frankfurt, Centre d’art contemporain de
Brétigny, Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires, El Museo del Barrio and The Brooklyn Museum of Art in
New York, among others. She has participated in the Liverpool, Moscu, Prague, Mercosur and Cuenca Biennials.
Pintura de sangre, Mexico, 2008
Courtesy of Y Gallery
Installation view
Y Gallery façade view
during exhibition
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DIEGO RIVERA: HIS MURALS AND THE CONSTRUCTION
OF MEXICAN NATIONALISM Book presentation
ENANITOS TOREROS BY LIVIA CORONA
May 30. Americas Society
Book launch
July 18. Powerhouse Books Arena
Co-organized by Americas Society and the Institute, participants discussed the trajectory of the outstanding artist
With Enanitos Toreros (powerHouse Books, 2008) photographer Livia Corona directed an all-encompassing look
Diego Rivera, his role in recent Mexican history, and his relationship to politics and the public sphere.
into the lives of the so-called Dwarf Bullfighters of her native Mexico. Over the course of almost a decade, Corona
traveled and lived with them, documenting the families, shows, spectators, and everyday life of this community of
Panelists included Juan Rafael Coronel Rivera (Co-editor of Diego Rivera: the Complete Murals), Dr. Javier Garciadiego
itinerant artists. The resulting images and interviews transcend scale and spectacle, and touch on the complex role that
(President, El Colegio de México), and Dr. Robin Adèle Greeley (University of Connecticut). Introductory remarks were
dwarf bullfighting has come to play in the slowly evolving identity and perception of little people in Mexico.
made by Amb. Rubén Beltrán.
The Institute collaborated in the launch of the book at Powerhouse Books Arena in Dumbo, Brooklyn. The public had
The event launched the new publication by TASCHEN titled Diego Rivera: The Complete Murals. This lavish volume
the opportunity to interact with the photographer in a musical atmosphere provided by DJ Lasser Gun #1.
features numerous large-scale details of the murals.
In his murals, Rivera addressed social and political issues regarding revolutionary art and the working class, earning him
a legendary status in his home country as well as abroad. He was also invited to work outside of Mexico - most notably
for the commission for a mural at the Rockefeller Center in New York City which stirred up controversy when Rivera
chose to include a portrait of Lenin. This resulted in the piece being destroyed before it was ever finished.
Juan Rafael Coronel Rivera
Reception at Powerhouse Books Arena
Dr. Robin Adéle Greeley,
Juan Rafael Coronel Rivera and
Javier Garciadiego
Amb. Rubén Beltrán with panelist
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Book cover
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JOAQUÍN SEGURA AT INSTRANSIT
ARTEMIO 13 SOLO SHOW BY ARTEMIO
Joaquín Segura´s participation at Intransit resulted from the residency FONCA/Mexican Cultural Institute program at
Y Gallery in collaboration with The Mexican Cultural Institute presented Artemeio 13 for which Artemio has chosen
the International Studio and Curatorial Projects. The exhibition brought together 30 artists working in different media
to confront our massive industrial production of weapons, their intromission into our daily lives and the subtle effects
including ceramics, drawing, painting, sculpture, film and video.
this has on our minds. He combines the aesthetic qualities of mosaics and mandalas with the easy, desirable shape of
July 10 – August 30. Moti Hasson Gallery
September 13 – October 11. Y Gallery
guns, creating attractive pieces that remind us how quickly we can digest anything if it is nicely presented.
According to curator Omar López Chahoud, the exhibition aims to deal with the cracks in the urban landscape and its
decay, the artists have built cross sections of ecological, racial, and identity issues as metaphors. These meditations,
War and violence are themes Artemio has addressed from early in his career. The concept for this particular
rife with ethnographic, historical and natural symbolism, help to reinforce a position amidst surmounting struggles – for
exhibition was born as he flipped through a magazine devoted to guns and weapons. At the time Artemio was
instance, the fight against global warming and the disappearing ideal of the globalized world – to assert their multi-
fascinated with fractals and mandalas and the spiritual aspect of their traditions. He decided to create his own
faceted voices and identities. This show presented a dynamic look at today’s society, a complex and poetic visual
using images of weapons. At first, they were intended as stencils for street graffiti though over time, they evolved into
journey.
photographic impressions on canvas. In addition, Artemio presents carpet and flooring influenced by Spanish and
Arabic geometric figures as well as spaces reflecting our seemingly appetite for destruction.
The presentation of the new series coincided with the moment in the U.S. when people are considering what has
happened in the past in order to decide the best way to go into the future.
Artemio was born in Mexico City in 1976. He has shown internationally in galleries and museums such Museo de Arte
Contemporáneo Carrillo Gil, CCA Wattis Institute for Contemporary Art San Francisco, MUSAC Museo de Castilla y
Leon, CECCH Centre d’edition Contemporaine Geneve, Musee d Art Contemporain de Lyon, Hayward Gallery in
London among others. He has participated in Sexta Bienal de Video y Nuevos Medios and in the 1st Torino Triennial.
Courtesy of the artist
Artemio lives and works in Mexico City.
Joaquín Segura
Go Take A Leak In Some Gallery Corner, 2002
sawdust
Installation at Y Gallery
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29
THE FAN AND THE SHIT
SOLO SHOW BY ALEJANDRO ALMANZA
September 12 – October 25. Magnan Projects
OTHER OPTIONS: NEW YORK
September 18 – October 11
Eyebeam: Art and Technology Center
Eyebeam presented Other Options, a traveling and evolving exhibition of artists’ projMagnan Projects and Magnan Emrich Contemporary in collaboration with the Mexican Cultural Institute presented
ects that re-interpreted, altered, and created infrastructures that affects their everyday
Alejandro Almanza Pereda’s The Fan and the Shit, his second solo show with the gallery.
lives. The exhibition was curated by Chicago-based collective InCUBATE (The Institute
for Community Understanding Between Art and the Everyday) and featured work by
In The Fan and the Shit, the in-your-face approach and raw materials used to create imposing “active” physical
Mexican artist and Eyebeam senior fellow Geraldine Juárez.
structures in his earlier works transitions to a more subtle, contemplative approach. The equilibrium of forces and
materials give way to create relationships with objects that create situations in which the viewer is faced with
Juárez also presented Tanda Project , an experimental and informal not for profit
challenges to commonly held perceptions.
Foundation held and run by its users. Tanda Project aims to find new ways to support creative practice, without institutional inertia and encouraging users to give small
economic donations to build a public fund in order to support artist creativity free of an
institutional agenda.
Other Options consisted in exhibitions and programs investigating the ways in which
artists are dealing with the current climate of support for cultural production. They have
been taking place across the United States since October 2007 (the show has traveled
Opening reception at Eyebeam
to Chicago, Grand Rapids, Pittsburgh and Syracuse). By increasingly incorporating
new models of resource allocation, community building, funding structures and forms
of exchange as part of their artistic production, these artists are creating new possibilities for the role of contemporary art in an everyday context.
The exhibition was partially funded by the Institute.
PERCEPTUAL TRANSFORMATIONS
PEDRO REYES ON CARLOS CRUZ-DIEZ Panel Discussion
October 14. The King Juan Carlos of Spain Center-NYU
For your own safety, 2008.
Out to lunch (gone for the day), 2008.
Equilized Power Amplifier, 2008.
This multidisciplinary panel focused on theories of perception, phenomenology, and
the development of spectator participation in artworks such as Carlos Cruz-Diez’
Cromosaturación and Pedro Reyes’ Leverage. Speakers included: Nuit Banai,
(Art Historian), Marisa Carrasco, (Chair of Psychology, New York University), Pedro
Reyes, (Visual Arts), Edward Sullivan, Moderator (Dean of Humanities, New York
University).
This program was presented as part of Carlos Cruz-Diez’s first solo show in a major
U.S. cultural institution: Carlos Cruz-Diez: (In)formed by Color at the Americas Society.
The participation of Pedro Reyes was made possible with the support of the Institute.
30
Edward Sullivan,
Dean of Humanities, NYU
Marisa Carrasco,
Chair of Psychology, NYU
Pedro Reyes
Artist
Nuit Banai
Art Historian
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NO MATTER WHAT HAPPENS TO YOU, WE WILL
KEEP GROWING SOLO SHOW BY GABRIEL ACEVEDO
VELARDE October 18 - November 15. Y Gallery
ELENA CLIMENT: AT HOME WITH THEIR BOOKS
Y Gallery in collaboration with the Mexican Cultural Institute presented Acevedo Velarde’s first solo exhibition in New
The Mexican Cultural Institute organized a reception in honor of Mexican artist Elena Climent for the inauguration of her
York. The show opened with a video-based performance that depicted features of a conference, a music concert, and
mural “At Home With Their Books” located in the Language and Literature Building of New York University.
Mural inauguration and reception
November 12. New York University
a political speech, unfolding a rather intimist discourse. The notion of society as an organism raises many questions,
such as how to trace the borders between individuals and groups, or how to re-invent freewill in a context that seems
Elena Climent is a distinguished painter in the realist tradition whose work has been seen in some of the principal muse-
to be forcing tricky collective integrations.
ums and galleries in the U.S., Europe, and Latin America. The mural, measuring 30 ft. wide by 10 ft. high and comprising
six panels, is the artist’s largest work to date. It depicts intimate scenes of the spaces in which famous writers that lived
Acevedo’s work constantly oscillates between these general issues and personal, meaningless-looking matters, thus
in New York City composed their well-known novels, poems, or essays, presented in chronological order. The spaces
finding a place for individual poetics in the midst of distorted universalist projections. “It scares me when someone
depicted belonged to Washington Irving, Edith Wharton, Zora Neale Hurston, Frank O’Hara, Jane Jacobs, and Pedro
makes a pompous statement about something one agrees with; that’s how I feel with my internal voice”. A video-
Pietri.
document of the performance remained in the gallery after the opening day, along with drawings and digital prints
related to the presentation.
“I left the writer out of the scene to give the impression that she or he will be back at any moment and allow the viewer
to imagine the possibility of walking into the room,” said Climent. “The mural also shows what has not changed and this
is the continuing emergence of new writers and the love of writing.”
The event counted with the attendance of approximately 100 guests, including historian Friedrich Katz; NYU’s Dean of
Humanities, Edward J. Sullivan and Amb. Rubén Beltrán.
Courtesy Y Gallery
Images of the video performance
Minister Raúl Zorrilla, Artist Elena Climent
and Amb. Rubén Beltrán
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VIS-À-VIS: TERCERUNQUINTO
Panel discussion
November 19. Americas society
The Institute, in collaboration with Americas Society through its Vis-à-Vis program that invites artists to talk about their
work, presented a panel discussion with Mexico City-based collective Tercerunquinto, formed by Julio Castro, Gabriel
Cázares, and Rolando Flores. The artists discussed their work with Eungie Joo, Director of Education and Public Programs at the New Museum of New York and Taiyana Pimentel, independent curator based in Mexico City.
Tercerunquinto’s work jointly manipulates architectural elements to change the spatial dynamics of interior and exterior
spaces in order to examine their limits and alter their functions. A reception followed the discussion.
From left to right, Eungie Joo, Julio Castro, Phillip Penix-Tasden,
Gabriel Cazares, Rolando Flores and Taiyana Pimentel
Courtesy of the artist
Tercerunquinto
Removal and Reinstallation of a Patriotric Symbol, 2008
Tlatelolco University Cultural Center
Mexico, D.F.
Various days before October 2nd, a team of specialists got to work on the
removal of six marble pieces located in one of the sides of the former
Mexican Foreign Affairs office building. This group of marble pieces
contained a relief of Mexico’s coat of arms.
The idea consisted in that only on October 2nd, in the framework of the
commemoration of the student killings of 1968, this representation
of the State would be premeditatedly absent.
On October 3rd, the marble pieces
containing the national emblem were reinstalled.
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PINTA NEW YORK’S FIRST CONTEMPORARY
LATIN AMERICAN ART FAIR
November 13-16. The Metropolitan Pavilion & The Altman Building
PINTA is a unique annual event exhibiting through participating galleries that coincides with Christie’s and Sotheby’s
Latin American art auctions as well as with important exhibitions in museums and cultural institutions in New York City.
The fair organizers invited galleries from the United States, Latin America and Europe to participate in this event. In
its second edition in 2008 only 35 galleries participated showing museum-quality works representative of abstract,
concrete, neoconcrete, kinetic and conceptual art, as well as of other contemporary art movements.
The Institute supported the participation of Mexican galleries at the fair by facilitating the presence of their artists.
FILM
Pintura de sangre,
Teresa Margolles, 2008 and
Los pasos perdidos,
Milagros de la Torre, 1998
Sandra Valenzuela,
X-Boyfriend, 2007-8
Work by Artemio, Gabriel Acevedo
and Milagros de la Torre
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LABYRINTHS OF MEMORY
TRIBECA FILM FESTIVAL
New York Jewish Film Festival
January 23. The Walter Reade Theater at Lincoln Center
April 21 – May 4.
The Tribeca Film Festival has become one of the most prominent film festivals in the world. The Festival’s program
A total of 32 shorts, dramas, and documentaries from Germany, Hungary, France,
line-up offers moviegoers a wide variety of independent films including documentaries, narrative features and shorts,
Argentina, Russia, the US, Mexico, Canada, Israel, the United Kingdom, and Austria
as well as a program of family-friendly films. This year’s the following Mexican films were included:
added up to an exhilarating worldwide journey. Labyrinths of Memory was this year’s
Mexican film by director Guita Schyfter. The film is a documentary that tells the parallel
A Portrait of Diego: The Revolutionary Gaze
stories of two women (Guita Schyfter and Tete) that investigate their origins – one in
Directed by Gabriel Figueroa Flores and Diego López Rivera
Ukraine and the other in Chiapas, Mexico.
International Premiere, Documentary
Presented by the Jewish Museum and the Film Society of Lincoln Center as part of The
New York Jewish Film Festival.
My Life Inside
A Q&A with the director was made possible thanks to the support of the Institute.
International Premiere
Directed by Lucía Gajá
Love, Pain and Vice Versa
Director Guita Schyfter
Directed by Alfonso Pineda-Ulloa, written by Alex Marino
World Premiere
Chevolution
Directed by Trisha Ziff and Luis López
TEMPORADA DE PATOS
April 21. Anthology Film Archives
Dusk
Directed by Gary Alazraki
New York Premiere
The presence of the directors of the films was made possible thanks to the support of the Institute.
Temporada de Patos (Duck Season) directed by Fernando Eimbcke takes you into
one particular Sunday morning in the lives of two fourteen-year old boys, Flama and
Moko, who live in the Tlatelolco housing complex. With their neighbor Rita and pizza
delivery boy Ulises, they create their own adventures to overcome their boredom. Duck
Season explores the loneliness of childhood, the effects of divorce and the curious
power of love and friendship.
Winner of numerous awards, including an unprecedented 11 Ariel Awards, the film was
produced by Christian Valdeliévre, Lulù Productions, and Cinepantera, and executive
produced by Jaime Ramos.
A Q&A with the director followed the screening. This presentation was part of the public
programs of Museum as Hub, a collaborative project by the New Museum of Contemporary Art and the Mexican Cultural Institute.
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39
HOLA MEXICO! FILM FESTIVAL
VOY A EXPLOTAR
July 23 – 27. Quad Cinema
New York Film Festival
September 28 and 29. Ziegfeld Theater
Hola Mexico! is the first film festival dedicated exclusively to mexican cinema in New York. Thirteen Mexican films were
The Film Society of Lincoln Center presented the film Voy a Explotar (I´m Gonna Explode) by Mexican director
screened at the Quad Cinema as a result of a collaboration with the Mexican Cultural Institute.
Gerardo Naranjo within the framework of the New York Film Festival. A cocktail reception at the Rivington Hotel
followed the screening.
Featured Films:
3:19 (Dany Saadia, 2008)
I’m Gonna Explode is a mood-shifting mock epic that channels Pierrot le fou complete with Georges Delerue music,
Bajo Juárez: La ciudad devorando a sus hijas (Alejandra Sánchez y José Antonio Cordero, 2006)
albeit transposing the myth of the last romantic couple to an upper middle-class Mexico City exurb.
Fuera del cielo (Javier ‘Fox’ Patrón, 2006)
Nacido sin (Eva Norvind, 2007)
Ramon, the son of a sleazy right-wing congressman, contributes to his new high school’s talent show by ineptly
Quemar las naves (Francisco Franco, 2007)
attempting to hang himself on stage. Maru is the only one who claps. They bond in detention, and then it’s off in a stolen
Llamando a un Angel (Rodolfo Guzmán, Héctor Rodríguez, Pancho Rodríguez, 2008)
Volkswagen with daddy’s gun to the end of the night… or something like that.
Niñas mal (Fernando Sariñana, 2007)
Arresto domiciliario (Gabriel Retes, 2008)
Absurdist and ultimately heartbreaking, I’m Gonna Explode is further proof of Mexican cinema’s ongoing vitality, a
Mejor es que Gabriela no se muera (Sergio Umansky, 2007)
prime example of its nuevo nouvelle vague.
La Zona (Rodrigo Plá, 2007)
Luz Silenciosa (Carlos Reygadas, 2007)
The presence of the actors at the Q&A on both dates was made possible thanks to the support of the Institute.
Familia Tortuga (Rubén Imaz Castro, 2006)
The 13 films represented the current status of mexican cinema ranging from award-winning films and heart-warming
documentaries to intense dramas and comedies.
María Deschamps and
Juan pablo de Santiago
in Voy a Explotar
Samuel Douek, director of the festival,
Amb. Rubén Beltrán and Mariana Mora,
Director of the Mexico Tourism Board
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WOUNDED PRIDE, SIMMERING PASSION:
ROBERTO GAVALDÓN Film series
August 22 – 28, 2008. Film Society of Lincoln Center
Organized by The Film Society of Lincoln Center, FI CO Film Festival with the support of the
Mexican Cultural
Institute, this tribute examined a prolific and dynamic talent from Mexico’s cinematic history in Wounded Pride,
Simmering Passion: Roberto Gavaldón. The series presented nine films that span the rich variety of genres mastered
by Gavaldón in his 40-year career, highlighted by a trilogy based on the writings of enigmatic anti-capitalist writer B.
Traven: the Oscar-nominated fairy tale Macario, once-censored Rosa Blanca and the Hitchcockian Autumn Days.
Roberto Gavaldón was a consummate film professional who worked his way into the emerging Mexican film industry
beginning in the late ’20s, doing everything from acting to editing to assisting directors Alberto Gout, Alejandro Galindo
and Gabriel Soria. His long apprenticeship made him a detailed craftsman behind the camera, known for carefully
planning every shot in even his most modest productions.
The series also featured a heavy dose of film noir with The Other One, starring Dolores del Río and Night Falls, adapted
from the stories of Luis Spota, a Mexican journalist known for exploring the back alleys and dark passages of Mexican
society. The Littlest Outlaw represents the opposite extreme: Gavaldón’s only Hollywood film is a rarely screened,
Disney-produced gem about a boy who saves a horse from being killed by a Mexican general. Other films in the series
confront Mexico’s political concerns, from the questioning of absolute power in Rosauro Castro to the atmosphere of
suspicion aroused by rising immigration in Gavaldón’s explosive first film, La Barraca. Opening night featured a screening of Rosa Blanca, followed by Q&A with Roberto and Alfredo Gavaldón, sons of the director.
Autumn Days / Días de otoño (1963)
La Barraca (1945)
The Golden Cockerel / El Gallo de oro (1964)
The Littlest Outlaw (1955)
Macario (1960)
Night Falls / La Noche avanza (1952)
The Other One / La Otra (1946)
Rosa blanca (1961/1972)
Rosauro Castro (1950)
Soledad’s Shawl / El rebozo de Soledad (1952)
Ignacio López Tarso en Rosa Blanca
(México, 1961-1972)
Pina Pellicer and
Ignacio López Tarso
in Días de Otoño
(México, 1963)
From left to right: Paula Astorga, director of
FICCO Film Festival; Roberto Gavaldón Jr.,
Richard Peña, director of Film Society at
Lincoln Center; Mrs. Rosa María Beltrán,
Alfredo Gavaldón and Minister Raúl Zorrilla
Ignacio López Tarso en Macario
(México, 1960)
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EL FUTURO MAS ACA / THE FUTURE SOUTH
OF THE BORDER Film Series & Book Presentation
October 30- November 2. 92y Tribeca
Co-organized by Cinema Tropical and the Institute, El Futuro Mas Acá was a quirky and stirring film series
featuring some of the most representative Mexican sci-fi films made during the forties through the sixties. The series was
programmed by Itala Schmelz, Vania Rojas and Héctor Orozco and featured the films La nave de los monstruos/The
monsters’ ship (Rogelio A. González, 1959); El planeta de las mujeres invasoras/Planet of the female invaders (Alfredo
B. Crevenna, 1965); El Santo vs. la invasión de los marcianos/El Santo vs. The martian invasion (Alfredo B. Crevenna,
1966) and La momia Azteca contra el robot humano/The Aztec mummy vs. the human robot (Rafael Portillo, 1957).
Opening night featured a screening of La nave de los monstruos / The monsters’ ship (Rogelio A. González, 1959)
featuring special guest actor Lorena Velázquez followed by a reception and musical performance by rock band
Pistolera.
As part of the film series, the book El futuro más acá (UNAM-Ed. Landucci, 2005) was presented on November 1st at
the theatre by Itala Schmelz, publisher; Naief Yehya, critic; David Wilt, film historian and Héctor Orozco, curator of the
series.
Itala Schmelz, curator of the series; Naief Yehya, film
critic and writer; Héctor Orozco, curator of
the series; and David Wilt, film critic.
Lorena Velázquez in
El planeta de las mujeres invasoras
(México, 1966)
Minister Raúl Zorrilla, curator Itala Schmelz,
actress Lorena Velázquez, Cinema Tropical
director Carlos Gutiérrez, program coordinator
Aldo Sánchez, and curators Héctor Orozco
and Vanya Rojas.
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WADLEY
Latin Beat Film Festival
September 5 – 25. Film Society Of Lincoln Center
This collection of 28 outstanding films from ten countries promote a deeper
understanding of Latin America in all its vibrancy and complexity. Mexican films at this
year’s festival included: Cochochi (Laura Amelia Guzmán e Israel Cárdenas, 2007), The
Old Thieves: The Legends of Artegio (Everardo González, 2007) and Wadley (Matías
Meyer, 2008).
Wadley confronts solitude and nature in their most overpowering forms. A young man
with a backpack walks steadily into the unending Mexican desert, a mountain chain
visible on the horizon. He reaches an oasis, walks past a crossroads, stops to rest
and marches on, all the while engulfed by an expansive sky. His few diversions include
unearthing peyote, the legendary cactus known since pre-Columbian times for its
hallucinogenic effect and for providing deep spiritual insight. Completely without
dialogue, the film’s stunning images of flowing desert landscapes create a mysterious
and profound spiritual experience, drug-induced or not.
The institute invited director Matias Meyer for a Q&A after the screening.
HOLY DEATH, SUPERSTITION OR FAITH?
(Uxval Góchez, Mexico, 2005)
May 15. Instituto Cervantes
The Instituto Cervantes and the Mexican Cultural Institute co-organized the screening of Holy Death, a documentary that analyzes the celebration of the holy death by
participants of the rosary ritual in the Tepito neighborhood in Mexico City, in two towns
located in the state of Hidalgo and Veracruz and in New York City.
The screening was followed by a Q&A with the director.
46
PERFORMING ARTS
CELEBRATE MEXICO NOW
Festival
September 8 - 15
In 2008, Celebrate México Now marked its 5th anniversary as the first and only annual festival of contemporary
Mexican art and culture in New York City. Encompassing cuisine, dance, film, literature, music, theater, and visual art,
Celebrate México Now, with the support of the Mexican Cultural Institute, provided New York City with a glimpse of the
most intriguing artists and ideas pouring out of Mexico today.
This year edition of the festival included programs such as:
New York Authentic Mexican Restaurant Week: 16 Mexican restaurants offered prix-fix menus of traditional
recipes.
Available Space: danscores by Ofelia Loret de Mola. Choreography by Ofelia Loret de Mola at City Hall Park.
Dance! with DJs Giovanni Escalera + Amylu. DJ´s night at Hecho en Dumbo.
The Other Lado. Photo exhibition by Aaron Alamo and Adarian Herschel Krustofsky at King Juan Carlos Center I
of Spain.
Poesia Mexicana Contemporanea. Reading of contemporary poetry by Ali Calderón and Xitlálitl Rodríguez;
and launch of the fall issue of the Mexican literary magazine, Reverso Revista Literaria, presented by founder/editor
Carlos de Alba and moderated by novelist Carmen Boullosa.
Gutierritos Pop Lounge. Mexican and Latin American rock, psychodelia, space age pop, ye-ye, lounge, mambo
and northern soulmusic by Selector Monobichi with visuals by Celeste at Hecho en Dumbo.
Polka Madre. Concert at Hecho en Dumbo.
New Mexican Short Films. A program of shorts by Mexican directors who have won awards at the Morelia
International Film Festival or received Tribeca Film Institute Media Arts Fellowships. Screening followed by Q&A;
with filmmakers Ernesto Contreras and Iria Gómez Concheiro. School of Visual Arts.
Funk-Klore from Mexico City. Concert by Rana Santacruz at Hecho en Dumbo.
DaPuntoBeat. Concert at Joe´s Pub.
Los Músicos de José. Concert at Joe´s Pub.
Fresa Salvaje: FACA + Sonido Dicoyoacán. A night of pop and cumbia from Mexico and beyond featuring
Da Punto Beat
FACA (Tijuana) and Sonido Discoyoacán (Coyoacán/Brooklyn) at the Delancey.
Norvak Poderoso DeMente: A Hypnotelekineticparanormal Show. Cabaret show at Spiegelworld.
Fandango! An evening with musicians, dancers, and poets, hosted by Semilla at the Smithsonian National Museum
of the American Indian.
Lila Downs Concert at Town Hall theatre.
Amb Rubén Beltrán and singer Lila Downs
at the press conference of the festival
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MAGOS HERRERA IN CONCERTJazz performance
January 12 at The Knitting Factory. May 28 at Cachaca.
September 17 at The Kitano New York
The Institute promoted a series of performances by Magos Herrera, a dazzling,
accomplished singer-songwriter known for her beguiling rhythmic scatting inflected
with soulful Latin-Andalusian phrasings. Magos Herrera´s signature sound elegantly
blends classic jazz styling with Mexican, Cuban and Brazilian melodies. Fluent in Spanish, Portuguese and English, her repertoire is filled with the yearning romance, intimacy
and enchantment of Mexican and Cuban sones and boleros, and sultry, languid sam-
A FIESTA OF MEXICAN BAROQUE MUSIC
February 26 – March 1. The Church of Saint Luke in the Fields
Concerts at SaintLuke’s & Polyhymnia presented A Fiesta of Mexican Baroque Music,
a series of concerts about music from the cloistered communities of Mexico, promoted
by the Mexican Cultural Institute. The series included 18th Century Mexican Masters:
Manuel de Zumaya and Ignacio de Jerusalem; and 17th Century Mexican Ceremonial
Music by Fernandes de Lienas & Lopez Capillas.
ba-bossa nova beats.
KINKY IN CONCERT
APAP ASSOCIATION OF PERFORMING ARTS PRESENTERS
Conference
January 11– 15. Hilton Hotel
February 29. Highline Ballroom
In coordination with the promotion agency Noche VIP, the concert of the Monterreyborn Kinky was publicized in all of the Institute´s media. An interview with band leader Gil
Cerezo was broadcasted in Dialogando, the Mexican Consulate´s radio program. The
With over forty years as an active arts service organization, the Association of
Performing
Arts
Presenters
(APAP)
is
the
nexus
for
the
performing
concert was attended by about 500 people.
arts
community and innovators in the field. Representing both the nonprofit and
for-profit sectors of the industry, APAP members hail from all 50 states and more than
15 countries across the globe and range from large performing arts centers in major
urban cities, outdoor festivals and rural community-focused organizations to academic
institutions, artists and artist managers.
The Mexican Cultural Institute rented and operated a booth that provided a space for
the Mexican delegation to network and distribute promotional materials.
The Institute also organized, for the Mexican delegation, a private tour to the New
Museum which was guided by Chief Curator Richard Flood as well as a walk-through
to the different venues that
conform Lincoln Center.
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51
ON/OFF NEW WORKS BY GERALDINE CARDIEL
Dance performance
March 21 - 23. Joyce Soho Theatre
KAMPION ALGORYTHM & BLUES
Avant-Hop and Nu-Electronica From Mexico
May 1, Lit Lounge. May 2, Hecho En Dumbo
Monoluna, Static Discos y Hecho en Dumbo with the support of the Mexican Cultural
Mexican born choreographer Geraldine Cardiel presented with the support of the Mexican culrural institute an
Institute teamed up to bring you a night of avant-hop-idm featuring Guillermo Guevara
imaginative program of world premieres at New York’s Joyce SoHo Theatre. The program showcased On/Off and
(Duopandamix) and Alvaro Ruiz (Balboa/Ruisort).
Map of Forgiveness, two new dances in which Geraldine Cardiel explored her expansive sense of movement and keen
understanding of choreographic structure. The music was composed by Latin Grammy winner Juan Sosa.
These Mexican musicians presented their new projects: Kampion and Algorythm &
Blues, in which they push their funky IDM experimentation even further to perform
some of the most exciting electronic music being produced anywhere in the world.
TRES GENERACIONES
International Contemporary Ensemble
May 2 & 5. Americas Society
For the past three years, the dynamic International Contemporary Ensemble has been
working on Tres Generaciones, a unique project that brings together the work of three
generations of extraordinary Mexican composers.
The festival was organized by Americas Society in collaboration with the Mexican
Cultural Institute and featured music by nine established and emerging composers
living in Mexico and the U.S. performing in concerts, lectures, and public talks throughout New York City.
Composers included Iván Naranjo, Víctor Adán and Mexicans Julio Estrada, Germán
Romero and César Ignacio Baca. Other venues included The Tank, Performance
Space 122, El Museo del Barrio, ICEhaus (Brooklyn Center for New Music) with
the support of Argosy Foundation Contemporary Music Fund and the New York
Department of Cultural Affairs.
Geraldine Cardiel
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53
CAMERINO 4
Dance performance
July 31. Queens Theatre in the Park
AN UNEXPECTED MEXICO: KINKY, ALEJANDRO
ESCOVEDO WITH STRINGS & PISTOLERA
August 9. Central Park Summerstage
Camerino 4, one of Mexico’s newest and most innovative companies presented an exciting dance performance inspired
Central Park SummerStage, a program of City Parks Foundation, presents performances of outstanding artistic quality,
in part by “theater of the absurd.” An eclectic combination of influences - including playwrights Harold Pinter and Eugene
free of charge, to serve the diverse communities of New York City and strives to develop audiences’ deepening appre-
Ionesco, the language of cinema, and Mexico City itself - provided the basis for this lively and ambitious program. Each
ciation for contemporary, traditional, and emerging artists as well as the communities in which these artists originate.
voice, word and sound, each conflict, and each moment of silence was vividly brought to life in three pieces, including
a world premiere called Acrílico, commissioned by Queens Theatre in the Park. Directed by Magdalena Brezzo.
Kinky is a five member electro-pop band from Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico created in 1998. Texas-born Alejandro
Escovedo blends his Mexican heritage with a roots rock/alternative country twist. Pistolera is an NYC-based quartet
The performance was preceeded by a reception hosted by Amb. Rubén Beltrán honoring the presence of members
that is redefining Latin alternative music, with their accordion melodies, pop-rock sensibilities and an unbeatable rhythm
of CLACNY (Coalition of Latin American Consulates in New York) and followed by the closing remarks of Amb. Beltrán
section.
and Minister Raúl Zorrilla and a Q&A with the choreographer and dancers.
Presented by National Geographic Traveler and the Mexico Tourism Board with the support of the Mexican Cultural
Institute.
Amb. Rubén Beltran, Raul Zorrilla, Claudia Norman
and Jeffrey Rosenstock
Camerino 4
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Kinky, Pistolera and Alejandro Escovedo
55
JULIETA VENEGAS
LOS MÚSICOS DE JOSÉ
El presente tour
September 11. Nokia theatre
September 13. Joe’s Pub
Grammy winner Julieta Venegas performed at the Nokia Theatre in Times Square
Los músicos de José plays its own powerful brand of instrumental acid funk, directed to the feet, gut and both hemi-
as part of her El Presente tour with support of the Institute through promotion of the
spheres of the brain. Themes and improvisations ride on a base of funky groove, reflecting both the fun-loving impulse
event.
of the group’s high school days, and the technical sophistication it has gained since then.
Tijuana born singer and composer interpreted songs from her MTV Unplugged recent
The band has played at international music festivals in Mexico such as Puebla, Chihuahua, and Sonora, and at Jazz
CD before more than 1,000 people and performed in other cities like México, Guadala-
Festivals in Mérida, Mexicali, and Mexico City, and at Vive Latino music fest in México City 2007. Los Músicos de José
jara, Lima, Santiago de Chile, Montevideo and Buenos Aires, among others.
is currently preparing its second album, which will be in stores in Mexico in October 2008.
THE METROPOLITAN OPERA HD LIVE
Auditorio Nacional, Mexico City
Septiembre 2008 – Mayo 2009
Thanks to the initiative and negotiations made by the Institute, the Auditorio Nacional became the first venue in Latin America to present live and high definition video
of the selection of the Metropolitan Opera House season. Performances included:
Opening Night Gala, Salome, Doctor Atomic, La Damnation de Faust, Thäis, La Rondine,
Orfeo ed Euridice, Lucia di Lammermoor, Madama Butterfly, La Sonnambula and La
Cenerentola.
Los Músicos de José performing
at Joe’s Pub
Renée Fleming in Thäis
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PERFORMING THE WORLD FESTIVAL 2008
October 2 – 5, 2008. All Stars Project Theater & John Jay College
The conference/festival brought together activists, artists, educators and scholars, who by practicing with
performance are creating a new way of relating, understanding and changing the world.
This year’s festival was the fifth Performing the World (PTW) gathering and by far the largest and most diverse.
LOS FANCY FREE
October 22, 2008. Lit Lounge
Presented by the Blueghost Publicity and Poni Republic CMJ Showcase, with the
support of the Mexican Cultural Institute, Los Fancy Free performed as part of the
Music Marathon & Film Festival, after various successful performances during the
summer.
Young performers from CASA (Centro de Asesoría y Promoción Juvenil, A.C.), Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua,
were invited to participate in the festival by presenting the workshop A Work in Progress: the Tools and Results
of a Young Group in Mexico and Their Process in Spite of Progress as well as a panel discussion on the subject
at the John Jay College auditorium.
The presence of the CASA young performers was made possible thank to the support of the Institute.
SIMPLIFIRES Piano´s
November 10, 13, 17 and 24. Residency at Pianos Club
Simplifires is a 4 piece line-up: 3 Mexicans (Shine on guitar, bassist Rodrigo and Alex
on the skins) and an Irish singer (Dave O). Formed through friendship and a musical
connection rather than any ulterior motive, the unusual line-up brings with it an
inherently different perspective on the nature of music, rock and roll and its undeniable
power to bring people together beyond any borders.
The group participated in a residence at NYC’s Pianos Club in which they played every
Monday during the month of November. Performances were promoted by the
Institute.
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THE WORD EXCHANGE
3rd Annual U.S./México Playwright Exchange Program
November 22 -24. Lark Play Development Center
The Word Exchange is a 10-day residency and theatrical dialogue between four Mexican playwrights, four U.S. playwrights, and the Lark community, created by LARK and FONCA with the support of the Mexican Cultural Institute.
Through the translation of new Mexican plays, the development of these plays with established U.S. artists, and New
York cultural exploration, the program established ongoing channels of communication and collaboration between
artists in the U.S. and México. This year’s program counted with the participation of Mexican playwrights Cutberto
López, Luis Ayhllón, Alfonso Cárcamo and Ernesto Anaya.
A public reading at New York Theatre Workshop was organized at the end of the residency, with an attendance
of more than 200 people, including Mario Espinosa, director of the Centro Universitario de Teatro, UNAM and
playwrighter Bertha Hiriart, members of the selection committee for The Word Exchange. Founded in 1994, the Lark
is a laboratory for new voices and new ideas, the Lark Play Development Center provides American and international
playwrights with indispensable resources to develop their work, nurturing artists at all stages of their careers, and
inviting them to freely express themselves in a supportive and rigorous environment. By reaching across international
boundaries, the Lark seeks out and embraces new and diverse perspectives from writers in all corners of the world.
With the aim to integrate audiences into the creative process from its initial stages, the Lark brings together actors,
directors and playwrights to allow writers to learn about their own work by seeing it—and by receiving feedback from
a dedicated and supportive community.
Photos by Cutberto García
Aliquam molestie turpis nec sem. Fusce odio lorem,
blandit quis, auctor vitae, tristique.
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LITERATURE
PEN WORLD VOICES / READINGS AND
CONVERSATIONS WITH WRITERS
April 29 – May 4
CORAL BRACHO
APRIL 30, May 2 & May 3, 2008
The Town Hall, Instituto Cervantes, New York Public Library Mulberry Street Branch.
CARMEN BOULLOSA
MAY 1, 2008
CUNY Graduate Center
PEN World Voices: The New York Festival of International Literature was composed of programs, readings,
conversations and debates that showcase international literature and new writers. The Festival was produced by the
PEN American Center, a nonprofit organization that works to advance literature, promote free expression, and
foster international literary fellowship. The Institute proposed the participation of Mexican writers Coral Bracho
and Carmen Boullosa who were present at various lectures during the festival.
This year Festival authors explored the theme of Public/Private Lives. Participants included Salman Rushdie, Umberto
Eco and Mario Vargas Llosa, among others.
Coral Bracho participated in three events at this year’s World Voices Festival: Public Lives / Private Lives alongside Peter
Esterhazy, Rian Malan, Ian McEwan, Michael Ondaatje, Francine Prose, Annie Proulx, Salman Rushdie, Evelyn Schlag
and A.B. Yehoshua; Readings from Europe and Mexico; & Correspondences: Bilingual Reading and Conversation with
Coral Bracho. She has published eight books of poetry, including El ser que va a morir (1982). Among her grants and
prizes are the Aguascalientes National Poetry Prize, the Xavier Villaurrutia Award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Her
poems have appeared in translation in American Poetry Review, Bomb, Conjunctions, and The Nation, and her new
book, Firefly under the Tongue: Selected Poems, is available from New Directions.
Carmen Boullosa is one of Mexico’s leading novelists, poets, and playwrights, and has participated in Personal Narrative and Public Consciousness. In 2007 she co-founded Café Nueva York, a group of writers who work in Spanish and
live in New York, dedicated to reclaiming the legacy of their forebears who also wrote in Spanish and lived in New York.
She will also be a consultant to Nueva York, a major exhibition to be mounted by the New York Historical Society on the
400-year history of New York’s relations with the Spanish-speaking world.
Salman Rushdie
The festival was partially funded by the Institute.
Coral Bracho
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Carmen Boullosa
TRIBUTE TO OCTAVIO PAZ
May 22. King Juan Carlos I of Spain Center
The tribute to Octavio Paz, scheduled on the 10th anniversary of his death consisted of a symposium that brought
together distinguished writers and scholars such as Enrico Mario Santí (University of Kentucky, KY), Yvon Grenier (St.
Francis Xavier University, Canada), and Consuelo Hernández (American University, DC). The three discussed some of
the most prevalent themes in Paz’ works: poetry, language, society, humanism and liberalism in modern times. They
also discussed political, philosophical and poetic thought in the modern intellectual as a means to enable a critical yet
enlightening articulation of our contemporary world.
The tribute was partially funded thanks to a grant by MexAm Cultural Foundation and was organized in collaboration
with The Mexican Cultural Institute of Washington, D.C., who presented the same event a day later at the Library of
Congress.
Amb. Rubén Beltrán giving the introductory remarks
Jo Labanyi, Director of the King Juan Carlos Center;
Enrico Mario Santí, University of Kentucky, KY;
Consuelo Hernández, American University, DC;
Yvon Grenier, St. Francis Xavier University, Canada.
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TRIBUTE TO CARLOS FUENTES
June 5
Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Mexican Cultural Institute organized a tribute to renown author Carlos Fuentes on the occasion of his
eightieth birthday and the 50th anniversary of the publication of his first novel La región más transparente at the
Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Presented by Ambassador Rubén Beltrán, Fuentes lectured on The Bicentennial of the Latin American Independences
after an introduction by renowned historian Fiedrich Katz. Among other topics, Fuentes analyzed the origin and development of the main Latin American independencies, current state of democracy, poverty levels as well as political and
social future of the American continent. He also pointed out some civil rights obtained throughout these two hundred
years such as free speech, respect to differences and remarked education as a key element for development in our
countries.
The tribute was the first of the celebration series that commemorated his eightieth birthday and served as an opening
for the Bicentennial Celebration of Independence and the Centennial of the Revolution that the Institute is devoted to
deserving in the next two years. The event was attended by more than 700 people and covered by various media
organizations from both Mexico and New York. This was the first public tribute commemorating the Mexican author of
titles such as The Buried Mirror, The Death of Artemio Cruz, Cristobal Nonato among others.
Photos by Julio César García
Photos by Diego Heckadon
Amb. Rubén Beltrán
Dr. Friedrich Katz
Amb. Ruben Beltrán giving the introductory remarks.
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ESCRIBIR SIN ESCRIBIR: MARIO BELLATIN
Lecture
April 15. Instituto Cervantes
FRANCISCO HERNANDEZ AT LA CASITA
Poetry reading
August 10. Lincoln Center Out-Of-Doors Festival
Every summer the Mexican Cultural Institute is invited by the Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors Festival to coordinate
Mario Bellatín (Mexico City, 1960) discussed his work as director of the Escuela
and sponsor the participation of a Mexican artist to be part of La Casita: A Home for the Heart. This year, Mexican
Dinámica de Escritores of Mexico City as well Salón de Belleza, Damas Chinas
poet Francisco Hernandez was chosen to give two public lectures – one in Lincoln Center and another at the Teatro
and El Gran Vidrio. In 2001, Bellatín won the Xavier Villaurrutia Award and in 2002
Pregones in the Bronx.
received a scholarship from The Guggenheim Foundation. His works have been
translated into German, Italian, Portuguese and English.
Francisco Hernández, born in San Andrés Tuxtla, Veracruz, received no formal education in creative writing or literature. Nevertheless he read voraciously and began writing poetry in the 1970s while he worked in advertising. He has
The lecture was organized by the Instituto Cervantes in collaboration with the
published more than 20 books of poetry. Among them are Mar de Fondo which earned him the Aguascalientes
Institute.
National Poetry Prize (1982), and Diario sin fechas de Charles B. Waite, for which he was awarded the Jaime Sabines
International Poetry Prize (2005). Several of his poems have been translated into English and appear in anthologies
such as Connecting Lines: New Poetry from Mexico (Sarabande Books 2006) and Reversible Monuments: Contemporary Mexican Poetry (Copper Canyon Press 2002).
FIRST STOP IN THE NEW WORLD: MEXICO CITY,
CAPITAL OF THE 21st CENTURY BY DAVID LIDA
Book presentation. June 12. Idlewild Books
First Stop in the New World is a panoramic literary portrait of Mexico City as a vibrant,
seductive, paradoxical city now commanding the world’s attention and showing us the
way to the future of urban life.
David Lida is an American who has lived in Mexico City for much of the last fifteen
years. In the United States, his journalism has been published in The New York Times,
Los Angeles Times, Culture & Travel, The Forward, Interview, Gourmet and The
Village Voice, among others. In Mexico, he wrote and edited for D.F. magazine. He
is also the author of an acclaimed book of short stories that take place in Mexico,
Travel Advisory, as well as Las Llaves de la Ciudad, a collection of essays he wrote in
Spanish.
A recepetion organized by the Institute followed the presentation.
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Francisco Hernández during his poetry
reading at La casita
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READING / WRITING MEXICO SERIES
September to November
City College of New York
JORGE VOLPI
SEPTEMBER 16, 2008
CARMEN BOULLOSA
OCTOBER 16, 2008
JUAN VILLORO
OCTOBER 23, 2008
BARBARA JACOBS
NOVEMBER 18, 2008
From September through December, The City College of New York in collaboration with the Mexican Cultural
Institute presented a series of conferences given by Mexican writers as part of the CCNY’s M.A. Program in Hispanic
Literature.
Dr. Richard Calichman, Director of the Department of Foreign Languages and Literature and Amb. Rubén Beltrán,
Consul General of Mexico in New York (and the Institute’s Honorary President) signed an agreement on October 16,
2008 in which both institutions agreed to give continuity to this project.
The first stage of the lecture series held at City College featured Jorge Volpi: En busca de México; Carmen Boullosa:
Rescribir el Renacimiento desde México; Juan Villoro: La ciudad como metáfora; and Barbara Jacobs: Las hojas muertas: Un fragmento y dos aproximaciones.
Carmen Bullosa, during her presentation of
Rescribir el Renacimiento desde México
Juan Villoro
Richard Calichman and Amb. Ruben Beltrán,
during the signing of the agreement.
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I AM GOING TO SPEAK OF HOPE:
SYMPOSIUM CELEBRATING THE WORK OF CÉSAR VALLEJO
October 29 - 31. Americas Society
launching of a literary prize in the name of Mexican writer Aura Estrada, who died on July 25, 2007.
Hofstra University co-hosted the inaugural reception for “I am Going to Speak of Hope,” an
international symposium on Vallejo (1892-1938) that took place at Hofstra.
The Institute administer all donations as fiscal sponsor of the prize. The prize announcement took place on
December 1st, 2008 at the International Book Fair in Guadalajara and was presented by Gabriela Jauregui, Frank
The reception at Americas Society included opening comments by David Shapiro,
Goldman, Gabriel García Márquez and Raúl Zorrilla.
José Augusto
Tenorio, Consul General of Peru in New York; the poet Miguel-Angel Zapata (Hofstra
University),
Isaac
Goldemberg
(Hostos
College/CUNY),
and
Prof.
New York City
The Mexican Cultural Institute, along with Paul Auster and Salman Rushdie, among others, have taken part in the
Commemorating the 70th anniversary of César Vallejo’s death, Americas Society and
Director of Literature Programs at Americas Society; speeches by
THE AURA ESTRADA PRIZE
Stephen
The Aura Estrada Prize will be awarded biannually to a female writer, 35 or under, living in Mexico or the United States,
Hart
who writes creative prose (fiction or nonfiction) in Spanish. It will include a stipend and residencies at three writer’s
(University of London). Bilingual readings of Vallejo’s poems and other poetry were
colonies: Ucross in Wyoming, Ledig House in New York, and Santa Maddalena in Tuscany, Italy. Residencies can last up
carried out by Silvia Castillero, Antonio Deltoro, Eduardo Mitre, Rodolfo Hinostroza,
to two months each. The prize Granta en Español will also publish an excerpt of the winner‘s writing.
Víctor Manuel Mendiola, and Roger Santivañez.
On September 18, 2008, the Institute co-organized a cocktail reception was held in New York to raise funds for the
The participation of Silvia Castillero and Eduardo Deltoro was possible thanks to the support
Aura Estrada Prize.
of the Institute.
REVIEW: LITERATURE AND ARTS OF THE
AMERICAS, ISSUE 77 Magazine Launch
November 20. The Americas Society
Raúl Zorrilla and Gabriel García Márquez
launching of this issue, co-sponsored by the Institute, consisted of readings by
contemporary authors Álvaro Enrigue (born and lives in Mexico) and Naief Yehya (born
in Mexico, lives in Brooklyn), both of whom were featured in the issue. The program
also included comments and discussions by Daniel Shapiro, Editor; Carmen Boullosa,
Guest Creative Editor; Lucía Melgar (UNAM), Guest Academic Editor; and Rubén Gallo
(Princeton University).
Photos by Cutberto García
Review’s issue No. 77, focused on Latin American immigration and culture. The
Naief Yehya, Carmen Boullosa, Rubén Gallo
Lucía Melgar and Álvaro Enrigue.
Gabriela Jauregui, Raúl Zorrilla, Gabriel García Márquez and
Frank Goldman at the press conference in Guadalajara
Review 77 featured a section of research articles by leading scholars on aspects of
immigration and culture and a creative section showcasing selections of poetry,
fiction, creative essays, and interviews by and about writers. This included Jorge Aguilar
Mora, Gioconda Belli, Enrique Fierro, José Kozer, Eduardo Mitre, Sylvia Molloy, Ricardo
Piglia, and Ida Vitale. The issue also includes reviews of newly published titles in English
and English translations, and pieces by/about artists from Latin America and/or explore
immigrant-related iconography and themes.
Editor Daniel Shapiro.
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Gabriela Jauregui reading at the benefit cocktail party
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AN EVENT OF CONTEMPORARY MEXICAN POETRY
Poetry reading
September 10. St. John’s University
The Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies (CLACS), Celebrate Mexico Now and The Mexican Cultural
Institute presented An Event of Contemporary Mexican Poetry as the official launch in the United States of the
Magazine Reverso, published in Guadalajara, Mexico, with the participation of its founder and editor Carlos de Alba.
Recognized Mexican poets Alí Calderón and Xitlálitl Rodríguez read at this event that was moderated by the renowned
poet and novelist Carmen Boullosa and Minister Raúl Zorrilla. Ambassador Rubén Beltrán, General Consul of Mexico,
gave the closing remarks.
RESEARCH &
ACADEMIC EVENTS
From left to right:
Alí Calderón, Xitlálitl Rodríguez, Carlos de Alba,
Carmen Boullosa, Dr. Alina Camacho-Gingerich,
Ambassador Rubén Beltrán,nClaudia Norman
and Minister Raúl Zorrilla.
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CAVE, CITY AND EAGLE’S NEST
AN INTERPRETATIVE
JOURNEY THROUGH THE MAPA DE CUAUHTINCHAN NO. 2.
Book Presentation. October 28. Americas Society
NEW EVIDENCE, 1400-1800
Cave, City and Eagle’s Nest, an interpretative journey through the Mapa de Cuauhtinchan No. 2 was programmed by
The Columbia University Center for Ethnomusicology presented the series “New
The Mexican Cultural Institute, Fundación Amparo and Americas Society and presented by Prof. David Carrasco and
Evidence, 1400-1800” (co-organized by Columbia’s Interdepartmental Committee on
Scott Sessions with an introduction by David Rockefeller at America Society.
Medieval and Renaissance Studies and the Bard Graduate Center).
The Mapa de Cuauhtinchan No.2 depicts the mythology, landscapes, pilgrimages, gods and daily life of various Me-
With the support of the Mexican Cultural Institute, associate professor of
soamerican ethnic groups and is considered one of the most beautiful colonial pictorials produced in the New World.
Christian Art and Architecture at Yale University
Prof. Carrasco has said that “this map was possibly produced by a Chichimec community from Cuautinchan as part of
“Aztec Christians: Reluctant Collaborators or Enthusiastic Partners?” and José
a legal dispute over land with the Spaniards and another Indian community. It is a rare document providing us a view
Pardo Tomás, member of the Department of History of Science at the Consejo
of an indigenous community struggling in the sixteenth century to hold its own.” The original document is dated in the
Superior de Investigaciones gave the talk “Medical Knowledge and Practices in a
1540s and records events from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries. The map passed to private collectors, its most
Creole Society: Texts, Objects and Images from New Spain 1576-1626”.
Lectures
October 30. Columbia University
Jaime Lara, gave the talk
Prof. Jaime Lara
recent owner being the Fundación Amparo who seeked professor Carrasco’s expertise in the subject to study the
document. The book was produced after a 5 year joint effort between scholars from Mexico, Europe and the USA.
The Fundación Amparo was founded by the Espinosa Yglesias’ family, part of the board of Harvard’s David Rockefeller
Center for Latin American Studies.
Prof. David Carrasco is a historian of religions specializing in hermeneutics in the study of religion, Mesoamerican cities
and religions, and the Mexican-American borderlands. His work has been focused on the symbolic nature of cities in
comparative perspective, using his 20 years of research in the excavations and archives associated with the sites of
Teotihuacan and Mexico-Tenochtitlan.
OUT OF THE CUBE
AESTHETIC, PHILOSOPHICAL, AND
DISCURSIVE APPROACHES TO GENDERED IDENTITIES.
Multimedia Symposium. September 26. University Of Buffalo (SUNY)
The collaboration of the Mexican Cultural Institute, with the Gender Institute at the State
University of New York at Buffalo brought together several important scholars around
the topic of identity as well as musicians, artists, and dancers who engaged with
Mexican artists Mario Lavista’s and Arnaldo Coen’s works.
Mario Lavista
Prof. David Carrasco
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RESEARCH ON MEXICAN DOCUMENTS
The Hispanic Society
The Hispanic Society archive counts with an important number of Mexican manuscripts
that remain unknown: 22 in indigenous languages, 10 of the Berlandier collection, 15 of
the Boban collection, 11 about the Mexican Inquisition and an undetermined amount of
documents about Emperor Maximiliano.
On 2008, the Institute identified these documents and established contact with the
Department of Institutional Development of INAH (Instituto Nacional de Antropología e
Historia) to discuss a potential agreement to create a research residency for a scholar
to classify, catalog and study these manuscripts and documents.
The Institute presented the project to Columbia and Chicago Universities in order to
propose a collaboration and generate a publication as a result of this research. The
defining of the project will continue in 2009.
TRADITIONAL &
SPECIAL EVENTS
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MEXICAN INDEPENDENCE DAY CELEBRATION
September 15. Queens Theatre In The Park
For the 198th Anniversary of Mexico’s Independence, the Mexican Consulate in New York along with the Mexican Cultural Institute, the Mexico Tourism Board and ProMexico celebrated this special occasion with a cocktail
reception attended by more than 300 people that included Dr. José Ángel Córdova Villalobos, Minister of Health of
Mexico; Dr. Guillermo Linares, Commissioner of the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs of the City of New
York, who gave the Proclamation on behalf of Mexican Independence Day, Consulate personnel, diplomats,
Consuls from various countries and members of the Mexican community in New York.
The evening concluded with a performance by a Mariachi group and a set of popular Mexican music.
Minister Raúl Zorrilla, Consul Gaspar Orozco, Amb. Rubén Beltrán,
Consul Carolina Ayala and Advisor Heenry Valdivia.
Photos by Julio César García
Dr. Guillermo Linares, Commissioner of the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs;
Mrs. Beltrán; Mrs. Córdova; Dr. José Ángel Córdova Villalobos, Minister of Health
of Mexico during the official ceremony hosted by Amb. Rubén Beltrán.
80
DROP IN TO AVOID DROP OUT
Benefit for Asociación
Tepeyac’s Afterschool Cultural, Academic & Recreational Programs
April 29. The Penthouse of the Crown Building
A cocktail reception hosted by Chef Julian Medina was held in benefit of Asociación
Tepeyac’s After-School Cultural, Academic & Recreational Program with the goal of
fighting the drop-out rates among Latino students in New York City. The event was
supported by the Institute and assisted by special guests Arturo Sarukhan, Ambassador of Mexico to the U.S. and Rubén Beltrán, Consul General of Mexico in New York.
Musical entertainment was provided by DJ Collective Fresa Salvaje.
DAY OF THE DEAD
October 30 – November 2. St. Mark’s Church In The Bowery,
Mano a Mano: Mexican Culture Without Borders, with the support of the Institute,
MEDIA & PRESS
hosted the Day of the Dead celebration with a variety of events and workshops in the
churchyard of St. Mark’s Church. Visitors of all ages joined artists and volunteers in an
altar building. Mexican dancers from throughout the city assembled in Union Square to
walk in procession to the altar.
Visitors attended workshops where they learned traditional Mexican paper crafts,
sugar skull making, bread making and poetry writing. All of the workshops were geared
towards teaching the special foods, crafts and traditions practiced in Mexico for this
Day of the Dead altar
important holiday.
POSADA NAVIDEÑA
December 18, 2008. One River Place Building
The Mexican Cultural Institute organized a posada, a traditional holiday celebration.
Amb. Rubén Beltrán gave a festive speech before 180 guests conformed by members
of the Mexican Foreign Affairs Service, Consulate staff as well as representatives of
the Mexico Tourism Board, ProMexico and the U.S. – Mexico Chamber of Commerce.
Photo by Cutberto García
82
VISIT US AT:
WWW.MCINY.ORG
DIALOGANDO MAGAZINE
The Mexican Cultural Institute’s website, www.mciny.org is the best way for students, professionals and the general
Dialogando is a free monthly magazine published by the Mexican Consulate filled with
public to learn more about the Institute’s activities. It also serves as an informative up-to-date source for all Mexican-
Mexican-related news and information for the public.
related events in the New York area presented by other organizations and institutions.
The Institute acts as fiscal sponsor of Dialogando. On every issue the Institute
dedicates a page to that month’s featured events.
DIALOGANDO CON MEXICO
RADIO PROGRAM
Every Sunday from 9am to 10am Univision Radio 92.7 broadcast Dialogando con
México a program produced by the General Consulate of Mexico that always include
a section on cultural activities by the Mexican Cultural Institute.
In addition to providing the Mexican community with useful tools, suggestions and
information, Dialogando con México covers topics such as culture and sports and
features musical segments.
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THE INSTITUTE WOULD LIKE TO THANK THE FOLLOWING INSTITUTIONS AND ORGANIZATIONS
FOR THEIR SUPPORT DURING 2008:
92Y Tribeca
SPONSORS
Aryeh Neier
Helen Rosen
Peter Canby
All Stars Project Theatre
Delta Airlines
Peter Wells
Dos Equis
Asali Solomon &
Andrew Friedman
Honor Moore
Americas Society
James Wagman
Philip Gourevitch
Anthology Film Archives
FONCA
Jayne A. Philips
CMJ Music Marathon and Film Festival
Jarritos
Ralph Reese &
Daniel Samuels
Celebrate Mexico Now Festival
Jose Cuervo
Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies
at St. John’s University
LA Cetto Wines
CN Management
CUE Art Foundation
El Museo del Barrio
Eyebeam: Art and Technology Center
Film Society at Lincoln Center
Hecho en Dumbo
Idlewild Books
Instituto Cervantes
International Studio & Curatorial Program
Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning
Joe’s Pub
Joyce Soho Theatre
King Juan Carlos I of Spain Center at NYU
Knitting Factory
LaGuardia Performing Arts Center
LARK Play Development Center
Lincoln Center Out-of-Doors Festival
Magnan Projects
Mano a Mano: Mexican Culture Without Borders
New Museum of Contemporary Art
New York Latino International Film Festival
Noche-VIP
Pen American Center
Pianos
Powerhouse Arena
Quad Cinema
The Century Association
The City College of New York
The Graduate Center, City University of New York
The Hispanic Society of America
The Jewish Museum
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
The New York University
Tribeca Film Festival
Y Gallery
Zarela Restaurant
La Esquina
Mex-Am Cultural Foundation
Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs
Mexicana Airlines
Mexico Tourism Board
ProMexico
Taschen
Barbara Tolley
Beatrix Ost
Beatriz Ramos
Benjamin Anastas
Betsy Wice
Betty Aridjis
Bruce Weber
Carol Dysinger
Carolina De Robertis
Charlotte Labys
Christ Abani
Jean Marie Simon &
Ken Anderson
Jeff Levi-Hinte &
Kristen Kusama
Richard & Kristina Ford
Rigoberto Gonzalez
Jeffrey Levy-White
Rivka Galchen &
Aaron W. Harnly
Jennifer A. Lake
Robert Nickelsberg
Joanne Leeden-Ackerman
Robert Pierpart
John Sloss
Ron Chernow
Joseph Hardin
Roslyn Bernstein &
Shael Shapiro
Juan Garcia de Oteyza
Judith Hottensen
Julia Preston
Salman Rushdie
Sandra Cisneros
CORPORATE DONORS
Clare Messud &
James Wood
Fundación Amparo
Clare Rossini
Mex-Am Cultural Foundation
Clemens Family
Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs (SRE)
Corinna Barsan
Mexico Tourism Board
Daniel Alarcon
Kate Doyle &
Tim Weiner
National Fund for Culture and the Arts (FONCA)
Daniel Halpern
Lauren Wein
ProMexico
Daniel Wlkinson
Lila Zemborain
Aragi Inc.
Darcy Steinke
Lorin Stein
Barbara Goldsmith Foundation
David Unger
Louise de Salvo
BOMB Magazine
Lucy Ferris
Bookforum
Deborah Eisenberg &
Wallace Shawn
Colchie Agency
Deborah Seager
Lynne Tillman
Con Edison
Diana & Gary Fisketjon
Marra Compbell
Jewish Communal Fund
Dirk Wittenbarn
Martín Espada
Marina P & Stephen E. Kaufman Foundation
Donna DeCesare
Mary Cybulski
New Directions Publishing
E. Morgan Entrekin
Mary Gaitskill
Pangloss Productions LLC
Elaina Ganim &
Timothy Ventrimiglia
Mary Morris &
Larry O’Connor
Trinity College
Elena & A. Denny
Castedo-Ellerman
Melissa Gonzalez
Ted Joyce &
Judith Sackoff
Wylie Agency
Elizabeth Leon
Michael Cunningham
Thomas Harnly
Michael Ondaatje
Toni Morrison
Milla Riggio
Vendela Vida &
David Eggers
Porter Family Foundation
Elizabeth Netto
INDIVIDUAL DONORS
Elizabeth Schmitz
Jorge O. Mariscal
Ellen Tremper &
Peter K. Wayne
Ruth B. Mendez
Abby McCarthy
Alane Mason
Amanda Urban
Amitav Ghosh
Amy Hempel
Amy Hundley
Ana Menendez
Andrew Smith
Anita Glesta
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Audrey Baker
Eric Price & Greg Walker
Ernesto Mestre
Ethan Nosowsky
Fernando Eberstadt
Frances Dilustro
Galt Niederhoffer
Gary Scteyngart
George Moore
Gerald Marzorati
Jumpa Lahiri &
Alberto Vourvoulias
Junot Diaz &
Elizabeth De Leon
Lynn Nesbit
Nan Graham
Nancy Reisman &
Rick Hilles
Sarah Eggers and
Jacob Held
Scott Anderson
Scott Wallace
Semi Chellas
Sergio Ramirez
Sharon Delano
Sharon Dynak
Sidney Offit
Silvana Paternostro
Stanley & Gloria Plesent
Susan Bergholz
Susan Jacoby
Suzanne Rata
Sylvia Sellers García
Tanya Huntington &
Alvaro Enrigue
Tarik Hussein
Veronica Chambers
Vladimiro Dorfman
Natalia Perez
Wendy Ewald
Natasha Wimmer
Wendy Gimbel
Nicholas Dawidoff
Wendy Vanderbuilt
Oswaldo Zavala
William Anspach
Pamela Yates
William Vourvoulias
Patricia Storace
Yehudit Mam
Patrick McGrath
Zadie Smith
Paul Bernan
Annie Proulx
Giaranda Belli
Paul Lauter &
Ann Fitzgerald
Ariel Dorfman &
Angelica Malinaric
Gregory Grunaih
Paul Vidich
Hector Feliciano
Paul & Daisy Soros
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FINANCIAL INFORMATION MEXICAN CULTURAL INSTITUTE 2008
January 1 – December 31, 2008
FUND BALANCE AS OF DECEMBER 31, 2007
$ 208,253.46
INCOME
EXPENSES
Contributed Income:
Programs and Events:
Goverment
$ 25,000.00
Cultural Programs
Corporate and Individual
$ 175,839.74
General Expenses:
Total
$ 200,839.74
$ 164,571.46
Administration
$ 57,331.13
Photo & Copy Service
$ 278,034.94
Total
$ 335,366.07
Earned Income
Generated Income $ 411,803.00
Earned Interest Investment
$ 730.52
TOTAL EXPENSES
$ 499,937.53
Ad space for Consulate magazine
$ 19,200.00
INKIND EXPENSES
$ 332,681.22
Book Sales
$ 1,015.00
GRAND TOTAL EXPENSES
$ 832,618.75
Total
$ 432,748.52
NET INCOME
$ 133,650.73
TOTAL INCOME
$633,588.26
Inkind contributions:
$ 332,681.22
GRAND TOTAL INCOME
$ 966,269.48
FUND BALANCE FOR DECEMBER 31, 2008 TOTAL INCOME + 2007 FUND BALANCE
$ 365,150.25
$ 1,174,522.94
* The contributed income does not include in-kind contributions from the Mexican Ministry of
Foreign Affairs (SRE), Mexico Tourism Board, Mexicana Airlines, Delta Airlines, La Esquina,
Dos XX, Jose Cuervo, LA Cetto and Jarritos. The total for IN-KIND contributions for 2008 was
$ 332,700.00
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