Outside the Borders ëMexican Reportí Features 50 Artists With Diverse Styles, Materials by Gary Tischler Thereís a remarkable exhibition in Washington running this month called ìMexican Report: Contemporary Art From Mexicoîóand itís so big that it spreads across three venues: the Cultural Institute of Mexico, the nearby Meridian International Center and the Curatorís Office gallery. The exhibition includes some 100 works in the form of paintings, sculptures, installations, engravings and videos (the videos were shown at the Curatorís Office), many of which were created specifically for this display. ìMexican Reportî sounds like a sweeping title that attempts to show the scale, range and totality of Mexican art as it exists today and continues to evolveóbut itís a lot more complicated than that, said curator Santiago de los Monteros. ìThere are 50 artists in this exhibition,î he said. ìThere could have been hundreds more. We were not looking for ëMexicaní art. We were looking for Mexican artists, or foreign-born artists working in Mexico. The world is becoming more and more international, worldly, global, and thatís reflected in the exhib itionóbut then again not. We ended up with exchanges. The idea of the border, the one between the United States and Mexico, and what it means is very much present here.î Nevertheless, looking at the works, especially some of the installations and three-dimensional works, something subconsciously ìMexicanî emerges. There are ideas and feelings, compulsions and obsessions, the use of the human body, ideas of space, and riffs on death and violence that you would probably not find in certain regional American art, at least not in that way. The featured artistsí ages range from 28 to 55, so in a sense this is a ìyouthfulî show by working artists, with the exception of Luis Miguel Suro, who was killed in Guadalajara at the age of 32 while trying to defend his father from attackers in a factory. ìIt was very difficult to name this show because it implied a certain ëMexicaní style or solidarity of interests and viewpoints,î explained Monteros, an impassioned man who is not himself an artist. ìBut you can see [that] what characterizes Mexican art, and always has, especially today, is its diversity.î The shadows of the great mural artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo, especially in the Mexican Cultural Institute venue, are part of this show as well, acting as a force, memory and inspiration. ìEverything comes from there, certainly,î Monteros said. ìBut this is a generational thingóit always isóand everyone strikes out into new land, new territory.î The videos at the Curatorís Office have their own appeal and language, but the truly forceful parts of the exhibition are at the Mexican Cultural Institute, with a much quieter portion concentrating on paintings and drawings at the Meridian International Center. The first thing that greets visitors at the Mexican Cultural Institute as they walk through the door is a piece called ì360 RPM,î a startling and initially beautiful wood construction of a giant rolling wheel by Benjamin Torres. I say initially because once you realize that the material in the 88 pieces is composed of crutches, the thing itself becomes something differentóa kind of triumph where someone has polished the pain out of the joints. There is a lot of this type of varied sentiment in the exhibition: irony, morbidity, the violence of pop culture, and a resigned yet defiant stand on death and suffering. Here we see the image of machetes in the desert and the freeness of working with bodies and body parts, such as Gabriela Lopez Portilloís use of her own hair to make a haunting dress. American advertising, television and iconic symbols such Mr. Clean, Mickey Mouse, Garfield and Snow White also get a workout from the different artists, who share a kind of love-hate attitude toward the American pop culture so omnipresent in Mexico. Several visits are required and certainly helpful for such an expansive display. Because so much of the work in the Mexican Cultural Institute has a high quotient of drama and a certain excitable quality, the works at the Meridian Certain serve to give us a more reflective quality, especially in the box paintings of Boris Viskin, an inveterate chronicler of Mexican history and culture. ìMexican Reportî isnít so much a report as it is an offering. It has qualities similar to the many other smaller multi-artist shows at the Mexican Cultural Institute, where there is always a surprising diversity, range of interests, style and intensity, and variety of materials. Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes once wrote, ìIn Mexico, new art is also the oldest, and the oldest is also the newest.î There is no tension in that conceptórather itís a bridge that is heavily trafficked by many artists. And yes, it does have a certain Mexican feel to it, where the melting pot is still a reality. ìMexican Report: Contemporary Art From Mexicoî runs through April 22 at the Mexican Cultural Institute, 2829 16th St., NW, and the Meridian International Center, 1630 Crescent Place, NW. The video portion at the Curatorís Office ended in March. For more information, please call the Mexican Cultural Institute at (202) 728-1645 or the Meridian International Center at (202) 667-6800 or visit www.meridian.org. Gary Tischler is a contributing writer for The Washington Diplomat.