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Lifestyle/Arts  Leadership Summit to mark Women's History Month -Page 14-A  
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NIGHT LIGHTS ------- Page 14

San Antonio, Texas        Express-News      F Tuesday, March 12,1991  13-A

[[image - photograph]]
PHOTO BY JOSE BARBERA
[[image caption]]Merle Wachter has been studying Mexican art for over four decades.[[/image caption]]

[[image - graphic]]
FOCUS S.A. SCENE
      
Surreal Lecturer: Mexican art exotic, fantastic

By ED CONROY
Special to the Express-News

To Merle Wachter, Mexican art and culture are inherently surrealistic.

He should know. Since 1947, when he founded the art department at the City College of Mexico, Wachter has lived immersed in the extraordinarily variegated and fantastic world of Mexican visual art.  
 
"The exotic and the bizarre in Mexico intrigued me from the first," Wachter said in a recent interview at the Witte. "And the fascinating aspects of pre-Columbian art certainly caught my attention, as they have done for many people."  
 
Wachter's numerous professional activities in Mexico City as an art historian, painter and gallery director brought him into personal contact not only with eminent scholars but with many of Mexico's most celebrated artists, among them the "Big Three": Rivera, Siqueiros and Orozco.
 
Though he now lives in San Antonio, Wachter will be bringing his four decades of experience to what may be the most comprehensive lecture series offered locally in conjunction with the upcoming San Antonio Museum of Art exhibit "Mexico: Splendors of 30 Centuries."
 
As the second series in the Witte Museum's Humanities and Science Center's lecture program "The Climate of Change," Wachter's presentations will include three illustrated discussions of Mexican art from pre-Columbian through contemporary times. All of the lectures will be held at the Witte Museum, 3801 Broadway.

Wachter's first two-hour presentation, entitled "Pre-Columbian: From those Stoney Olmecs to the Awesome Aztecs" is scheduled for 9:30 am Tuesday, 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and 7:30 p.m. Wednesday.
 
The same hours will apply to Wachter's second and third lectures, which will follow on successive Tuesdays and Wednesdays through March 27. They are entitled, respectively, "Spanish Colonial: Century of Conquest" and "Contemporary: After the Revolution."  
 
All of the lectures in Wachter's series will follow the format that is the signature of all Witte Humanities and Science Center presentations. Participants sit at round tables in a large, open hall hung with various works of Mexican art. They will have the opportunity to engage Wachter and their fellow participants in discussion at designated breaks.  
 
Wachter also said that he will be bringing in many original works of Mexican art from his own collection and for examination by the participants, in addition to numerous slides and records of Mexican music.  
 
"I look forward to contrasting the image of the Aztec great mother goddess Coatlique, covered in serpents, with an image of a madonna and child by Rafael, to show what differing conceptions of motherhood humanity has had," said Wachter. 
 
Demand for Wachter's current services has been so great that the Witte has scheduled another, more extensive lecture series to run at the Humanities and Science Center from April 23 through May 23. For information on either series, phone the Witte at 820-2135.