Por Alejandro Montes Santamaria

More than twelve years ago in the city of Guanajuato, José Luís Méndez Ortega, then a young artist without much experience, was motivated by his inability to exhibit in the already established spaces and by the additional objective of bringing art closer to the people who normally don't visit these spaces. He decided to use the Day of the Dead as his excuse and on November 2nd 1988 he assaulted the streets with his work. After 1997 this street exhibit would become known as Muerte en Cartelera (Death on the Billboard). I prefer to recount the following based on my personal experience, because what occurred before I became part of this event, I can only presume. In 1998 I found myself studying design and I took some elective courses in the school of Fine Arts in the University of Guanajuato,
where my teacher was the great grave robber, José Luís, who invited me to show my work in an exhibit of ephemeral art in public spaces called Muerte en Cartelera. It is ephemeral because all of the work that is exhibited that day is placed on the streets of the city, which is converted into an immense gallery, and is simply abandoned there, and by consequence, dies, because somebody either takes it to their home, or the elements destroy it, or the intolerance of the spectator obliges them to intervene or destroy the work. And the end of each piece is as varied as death itself.

MC has actually earned itself a place among the artistic spaces of the city and has gained strength on a national and international level. We have participants from various states of the republic, which I won't list here for fear of excluding one. As far as international participants we have representatives from the USA , Canada , Belgium and Spain.

Pedro Ascencio, Francisco Patlán, José Luís Méndez, Octavio Bajonero, Carolina Korber, Gilberto Guerrero, Angélica Escárcega, Alfredo Nieto, Ferrus, Luís Garzón, Capello, Carlos Marmolejo, Juan Meliá, Juan Jorge Prado and Sergio Ávila, among others, are some of the personalities of fine arts who have participated in Muerte en Cartelera. This year artists such as Joel Rendón, Yuyi Morales and Artemio Rodríguez (a Michoacán native living in Los Angeles , CA ) will also form part of the fine arts exhibit.

I've been coordinator for the MC for the past three years and for those of you that have been here and shared with us all sorts of anecdotes (like when some guy made a skull from feces and the Health Department had to come and clean up the disaster) you also know that you meet people who are doing something similar to you, you see techniques in every imaginable substrata: work that ranges from the most childish nuance to the most sublime artistic expression by creators already well-entrenched in the medium. The best part of the MC is that there are no boundaries of language, religion, age or sex. Much like death, we don't discriminate against anyone.

To learn more about MC or receive more information about this movement, don't hesitate to write us at muerteencartelera@hotmail.com