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 Entertainment | August 2007 
US Gets Dates With Mexico's Mummies
 Sara Olkon - Chicago Tribune
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| | A glass case separates visitors from one of the mummy exhibits on display during a 2003 visit to the mummy museum in Guanajuato, Mexico. (Tribune/Terrence Antonio James) |
Some of Mexico's most famous dead will head to Cicero, Illinois, this spring for a stay inside the town's new $50 million municipal center.
The mummies of Guanajuato - legendary in Mexico - are the remains of 119 corpses that have mummified naturally in this dry, hilly region of central Mexico. The mummies were accidental finds: Cemetery workers dug them up after their families stopped paying rent on the plots.
In a country where people see death as a reality rather than something to be shocked by or feared, the mummies have been drawing tourists for more than a century. They took on cult status with the '70s film "Santo Versus the Mummies of Guanajuato." Now, promoters are hoping to export their own brand of mummy-mania worldwide.
As of Tuesday, Cicero was first to book the corpses for a show outside Mexico. Still, the heavily Hispanic, blue-collar town may not be the first foreign stop for the mummies. Promoters say Los Angeles has also expressed interest.
Cook County Commissioner Joseph Moreno said he was approached by friends of the exhibit's promoters in Mexico, who told him about the for-profit venture. The promotion is in conjunction with the city of Guanajuato, which owns the mummies and will profit the most from the exhibit.
Cristina Saldana, chief of staff for Moreno and liaison for the exhibit, said her office approached Cicero after the National Museum of Mexican Art in Pilsen and the Field Museum both turned down a chance to host the display.
Carlos Tortolero, president of the National Museum of Mexican Art in Pilsen, said the mummy exhibit was "more history and science than art." A spokeswoman for the Field Museum said the institution was already booked three or four years out, so it couldn't accommodate the mummies.
"We then decided that we really don't need a museum to house them," said Saldana.
Cicero spokesman Dan Proft said the exhibit will likely be staged inside a gymnasium in the still-under-construction complex that will include a new town hall.
Saldana said she is confident the town will be able to replicate the climate conditions necessary to house the mummies. Cicero will get about 25 mummies for the temporary exhibit, set to run April 2008 through the Day of the Dead in November.
While details are still being worked out, the town is expected to make money from parking. Moreover, town officials would levy a 1-percent amusement tax on ticket prices, said Proft. Ticket prices are not yet set.
"It's exciting that we will be the first community in the world to host this exhibit outside of Mexico," he said. "It will be interesting for people of Mexican heritage but also just for art lovers. It's a way to add to the flavor and texture of the community."
Officials said the mummies have never left Mexico, but the museum began displaying a sampling of the mummies at area fairs in the country beginning in 2005. By the summer of 2006, the exhibitions grew more ambitious, with showings in Puebla and Monterey.
Saldana said close to 300,000 people came to the exhibit in Monterey. She estimates that the Cicero showing will attract 500,000 to 1 million visitors.
Which mummies will be on display in Cicero is still under consideration by the curators, Saldana said, adding that the "world's smallest mummy" - a 7-month-old fetus - will be flown in for part of the show.
Moreno said he wasn't concerned that the exhibit might be construed as offensive to some.
"It's a celebration of family and death," said Moreno. "I don't expect any negative remarks or negative feedback."
Tortolero said the Mexican attitude about death goes back to ancient times. "The major difference is that we live in a death-denying society" in the U.S., he said, so Americans might be shocked at the exhibit that would not upset people who come from a country where the holiday of El Dia De Los Muertos, or the Day of the Dead, originated.
The mummy exhibit "is a cultural event," said Saldana. "It's not all about bodies. It's about how we mourn our dead and how we celebrate the dead."
Indeed, Cesar Romero, spokesman for the Mexican Consulate in Chicago, said the local audience will cheer the arrival of the mummies.
"They are bringing it to Cicero, not to Michigan Avenue," Romero dryly noted.
The show is not aimed for the faint of heart. Most of the mummies have open mouths, as if they had been screaming. One mummy was clearly stabbed in the chest. One appears as if she were buried alive. Another died while pregnant.
Quite a few of the mummies still have their nails, teeth and hair.
"They are really scary and very creepy - not like mummies from Egypt," Romero said. "It will change the perception Americans have about mummies."
A more modern sensibility has found its way to the mummies of Guanajuato. In the early 1900s, cemetery workers charged the curious to walk into the ossuary building to check out a macabre display of the bodies. The mummy museum on Guanajuato opened in 1969, but the mummies weren't treated that much better - they were simply stacked against the wall. Today, the bodies are encased in glass and stand upright or lie flat on velvet pillows.
Tortolero of the National Museum of Mexican Art said the exhibit is in keeping with the country's attitudes toward death.
"Mexicans see death as a reality," he said. "Mexicans are more honest and open about it. Death happens. Death is around us. No one is guaranteed 72.5 years."
solkon@tribune.com Freelance reporter Joseph Ruzich contributed to this report |
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