Adrift

The members of the Committee of Monuments and Artistic Works in Public Spaces of CDMX (Comaep) seem concerned, although it does not help much, about the state of the base of the Christopher Columbus sculpture complex, as can be seen in the minutes of its 15 extraordinary session, last June, in which they recognized that there is an agreement with organizations and groups of activists to replace it “at some point”, which shows that there is no deadline for this to be fulfilled.

Meanwhile, the pedestal faces severe deterioration that at some point could be irreversible or compromise its integrity. Despite everything, the INAH has not disseminated the diagnosis of the piece nor has it agreed that the responsible area - which must resolve the erosion of the monument, the pulverization of the rock and the removal of graffiti - detail the implications of this impact.

In due course, Inti Muñozsubstitute president of Comaep, said that “there is already an agreement that remains in progress, the result of complex negotiation tables, in which the activists, the CDMX Human Rights Commission and the Secretariat of Government, where the possibility that the plinth could be moved and integrated with the old monument to Christopher Columbus was agreed upon”, but without setting a date, due to the political complexity of the issue.

This document also clarifies that it was the INAH's own National Coordination for the Conservation of Cultural Heritage that suggested the possibility of the sculpture being established in an open space within the convent in the Museum of the Viceroyalty of Tepotzotlán. Therefore, Diego Prietohead of the INAH, would have to explain to the public the academic and historical reasons they considered to make this proposal, because it would not be prudent for the institution in charge of preserving the cultural wealth of Mexico to have chosen to bury the complex for non-artistic reasons.

Added to this is a little-known fact: the Carmen Castro Barreranational conservation coordinator of the INAH, revealed that, at a certain time, the suggested space (in the Viceroyalty Museum) may not be available, so the headquarters could be modified.

Finally, Comaep referred to the preparation of a Landscape Master Plan for the surroundings of the former Glorieta de Colón (today of the Mujeres que Luchan), in order to organize aspects such as roads, urban geometry and its plant architecture. In addition to this, it is possible that the committee will seek pedestrian accessibility to the roundabout, based on the adaptation of pedestrian crossings, which could reignite the controversy.

THEY TAKE FINE ARTS

On the night of October 12, unionized workers (from the SINAT-INBAL-227 and SNTC/INBAL/ATM sections) closed the doors of the Palace of Fine Arts, preventing public access to the museum and the third performance of the opera. Florence in the Amazonof Daniel Catanunder accusations of corruption and non-payment of his work clothes.

A day before, INBAL, which runs Lucina Jimenezreported that the delivery of work clothes to base personnel had been completed, with the exception of the year 2020, when the health emergency was declared and indicated that for the current year, the annual supply of clothing, which will be delivered in Next December, it will allocate 41 million pesos, a not inconsiderable figure.

After the closure, INBAL issued a public apology, announced the rescheduling of the opera performance and recognized that both union fractions, which group 300 of its three thousand rank-and-file workers, damaged the cultural rights of citizens. However, they failed to explain what measures they will take to avoid future impacts.