Mexican artist Cito’s works on display at MCA

ORONO – The work of a distinguished Mexican artist, whose oil paintings are intended as “personal landscapes charged with spirituality,” is on view starting today through Sept. 1 at Maine Center for the Arts thanks to a collaborative effort between the University of Maine and the Mexican government.

Mexican painter Teresa Cito, along with Mexican officials from the Mexican Consulate in Boston, will attend a reception in her honor from 5 to 7 tonight at Maine Center for the Arts. “The Wings of Color,” a series of 18 oil paintings done by Cito in 1999 and 2000, will be displayed on the third floor of MCA.

Stephen Whittington, the Hudson Museum’s director, has consulted with Mexican officials on the authenticity of artifacts in the museum. He noted that UMaine students majoring in archaeology do field work in Mexico and Angel Loredo, associate dean of students at UMaine and a native of Mexico, has been working to raise the awareness about Latin culture.

“A lot of the artifacts in the museum are from Mexico,” Whittington said. “We also have a collection of modern Mexican folk art, so it seemed like a good collaboration. Teresa Cito is very well known in Mexico.”

Although she has lived and worked in Mexico City since the early 1960s, Cito was born to Italian parents in Libya in 1939. When she was 4 years old, the family moved to Florence. Cito studied at the National Institute of Art there from 1951 to 1956.

She arrived in Mexico City in 1962 and studied at La Esmeralda School of Painting and pursued sculpture at the San Carlos National School of Plastic Arts. Since 1974, she has worked as a professional painter. Her work has been exhibited in galleries and museums around the world including the San Diego Museum.

Cito’s abstract paintings have been described as lyrical on the Web site of the Italian Institute of Culture, which sponsored a show of the “The Wings of Color” series earlier this year in Toronto. The paintings were also exhibited in Montreal.

The institute said that Cito considers her paintings “personal landscapes charged with spirituality.” The artist achieves these effects by resting her canvases on the floor, casually throwing paint on them, and, then, meticulously turning the colorful chaos into abstract forms, according to the institute’s Web site.

Cito’s work has a dreamy and airy quality that often is associated with impressionist painters rather than abstract ones.

In “Torres,” or “towers,” the large canvas shows a series of gray towers that resemble skyscrapers against a green and yellow background; perhaps a sky. One small painting beneath it is of the tops of two towers, while another is of the bases of different towers.

“Tren de la Memoria,” or “memory train,” is a bit less abstract than the others. Green train engines and rail cars can be distinguished in this painting. They appear to be headed toward a rickety and rusting city. The smaller paintings are close-ups of the dark buildings and the train cars.

The soft reds and gentle blues of “Ofrenda,” or “offering,” are emotionally inviting. The dark form in the left-hand corner could be a human figure with arms stretching heavenward. The white heart shapes on the right side may resemble flames in dancing fire and the blue bits that float upward could be smoke, birds or prayers.

Whittington said that the exhibit “shows that our programming at the MCA and the Hudson involves all kinds of art, not just the performing arts. We want to keep doing exciting things like this exhibit to draw people into the building.”

“Wings of Color” runs through Sept. 1. Museum hours are 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. For more information, call 581-1901.