Noticias
The Mexico City Museum re-opens with the exhibition Mexico City in art. An eight-century journey
November 24, 2017The Mexico City Museum, an emblematic 18th century building, former Palace of the Countess of Santiago, reopened once again its doors after the restoration work supervised by INAH, with the opening of the exhibition Mexico City in art. An eight-century journey, a tour through the development, traditions, social, cultural and political events that make up the deep testaments of our city, from pre-Hispanic times to modernity.
The people in charge of the museographic proposal are César Moheno, Luis Rius Caso, Tomás Pérez Vejo, Alejandro Salafranca, Salvador Rueda and José María Espinasa, director of the Mexico City Museum.
Secretary of Culture, María Cristina García Cepeda and Eduardo Vázquez Martín, Secretary of Culture of Mexico City, headed the reopening of this space and the presentation of the exhibition, which was also attended by Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, International Affairs coordinator of Mexico City Government.
María Cristina García Cepeda celebrated that the public can once again visit this building located in the heart of the Historic Center, which has seen the passing of time and the transformation of a city that grows in all dimensions.
She said that this exhibition is a look that involves us all, because not only we contemplate ourselves from our city, but also we contemplate the world; an exhibition that interprets the city with its edges and flats, its conflicts and its moments of inspiration, as well as its evolution in history.
“The Department of Culture is honored to be present with works from the collections of our museums; with the contribution of our professionals, who enthusiastically took on this project which is at the same time a journey, a way through which Mexico's millenary history and identity travels”, she said.
Eduardo Vázquez said that the reopening of such a traditional place is the perfect setting for this great exhibition that is a timeline on the history of our nation full of fugues and shades.
He said that all the elements that create the imaginary of our city are present in this exhibition with pre-Hispanic references, the viceroyalty, the Mexico of the twentieth century, publications, caricatures, archives, cartographies, all essential collections to rebuild the vital elements of our history.
"Over 75 private collectors, foundations and institutions participated. The public will find a city that dialogues with time and the creation of our syncretism, of the elements that give us identity. It is impossible to leave this exhibition without feeling proud to be part of this city... a city of cities".
The exhibition presents 500 works by artists such as Frida Kahlo, José Clemente Orozco, Manuel Tolsá, José Guadalupe Posada, as well as pre-Hispanic pieces, publications, documents and cartography.
Curator César Moheno said that in a museum everything is dialogue and therefore this exhibition presents 193 artists along with hundreds of pieces that tell us about the redifinition of life in our city and a twentieth century that opens new times for equity and democratic life, as well as a river of diversity and genesis in the twenty-first century.
"This combination of art and history is what has motivated us to create this exhibition. In each room, the pieces have the quality of addressing questions to those who look at them with a past full of meanings. This work is a challenge that is at the same time an opportunity for children and young people. In the museum the school changes colors and notebooks and this exhibition seeks to transmit the sense of belonging and pride”.
Luis Rius Caso reminded that the public visiting this exhibition will find an original script where the works present the different periods of our city in a very natural and illustrative way, giving an account of cultural, political and social changes through iconic works.
Rafael Barajas "El fisgón" celebrated that the curatorial speeches taking part in this exhibition came together in a great way to cover the large scale of our city and the way it is rewritten and its history is reinterpreted.
"We are what we are and are as we are because of our history, only it explains our present. The pre-Hispanic part explains the magnitude, the colony reveals how this city was a bridge to the commerce of the East and the period of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries gives account of the cultural debates and changes of great importance”.
During the opening tour, the public could enjoy works such as the Commemorative Tablet of the Main Temple of 1487, the facsimile of the Codex Boturini from the 16th century, the Stone of the Coiled Serpent from 1325 and the Stone of Tlaltecuhtli from the same period.
It also highlights the Altar of cobs that the Mexicas dedicated to corn, the great oil painting of The Most Holy Trinity with San Andres and San Babilés from the fifteenth century and the canvas Encuentro de Cortés y Moctezuma by author and date unknown. A few steps away from this work, the public will find part of Pedro de Alvarado's armour, and crossing the hall, the 10-section screen that tells another part of the encounter between Cortés and Moctezuma.
Another piece celebrated by the public was the Coat of Arms of the city of Tlacopan in 1564 and the Map of México and its surroundings in 1763, as well as the oldest screen on Mexico City, made by Japanese artists in 1653.
The exhibition continues with the document of the invitation of the proclamation of Augusto Emperador on January 24, 1823, the oil painting of the Plaza de Santo Domingo painted by Pedro Gualdi; an ancient urban signposting in ceramic mosaic of the Camino a Iturrigaray; José María Velasco’s oil paintings: el Rio San Ángel and la Magdalena and El embarcadero de la Viga, by Joaquín Clausell.
Other works that enrich the exhibition are Frida Kahlo's Urban Landscape; Manifestación en el Zócalo de la ciudad, by Rina Lazo; La billetera by Antonio Ruiz "El Corzo" and the photograph entitled Ciclista Nezahualcóyotl by Héctor García where we see a man with a hat crossing with his bicycle between dozens of wooden light posts.
La exposición La Ciudad de México en el arte. Travesía de ocho siglos permanecerá hasta el 1 de abril de 2018 en el Museo de la Ciudad de México.
The exhibition Mexico City in art. An eight-century journey will be on display until April 1,2018 at the Mexico City Museum.
Mexico,Distrito Federal
