Art News

Mexico 200-Year Monument: Late, Costly, Un-Mexican

By: Mark Stevenson, Associated Press
MEXICO CITY (AP).- A huge monument intended to commemorate the 2010 bicentennial of Mexico’s independence uprising is late, over cost and doesn’t have much Mexican content, officials said Thursday. Ignacio Lopez, director of the company overseeing construction of the onyx-clad tower, said he had to rely on stainless-steel columns from Italy, quartz panels from Brazil and a specialized lighting system made by a German-owned company. “Between 63 and 65 percent of the content is foreign,” Lopez said. “The columns cannot be produced in Mexico.” “If a material is called for it doesn’t exist here, and only exists abroad, then it has to be brought in,” he added. The complex, 104-meter (343-foot) tall central tower is made of a series of columns that will support panels of onyx, which will be backlighted in changing patterns by LED panels sandwiched between two layers of the translucent stone. The monument in downtown Mexico City was supposed to be