By Laura Hand
Tuesday, September 23, 2008 at 6:33 p.m.
In an era of school security and limiting visitors, Mexico Academy has a sign outside welcoming visitors, to come see an art masterpiece that graces the school's upper lobby. It's called 'La Guerre d'Independance' --five scenes commemorating our Revolutionary War, and they're unique in the world: The White House, in Washington, also has a set, but they are displayed in two rooms. Mexico's can be seen at one glance. Interim Principal Pete Backus says they're a source of pride for students and alumni of the school. He was a student at Mexico Academy, and remembers the reverence for the museum like setting.
Dr. Kenvyn Richards, a retired SUNY ESF professor, was part of the school board that installed the murals back in the early 1980s. They're actually called 'scenics' and only two of the scenes are historically accurate: the battle of Weehawk Hill (NJ), and Washington's entry into Boston. Others depict a battle at Natural Bridge, Virginia and another battle at Niagara Falls, and British General Cornwallis is depicted surrendering to Washington at West Point (it actually happened at Yorktown, Virginia).
Printing the panels was a massive undertaking: they're actually 32 strips, 12 feet tall, colored by 220 wood blocks, one block for each color. A first printing was done in 1850, with the second in 1930--at that point some of the blocks had been lost in World War I, according to Richards, and had to be recreated. The blocks were lost in World War II (the artwork originated in France)---so there will be no more copies.
As you look at the scenes, you can see how they had to be lined up to match. One curiosity: a soldier's firing his rifle on the edge of one mural...you see the fire from the gunbarrel in the next over.
How the scenes got to Mexico is a story in itself: A partial set had been installed in 1937, and inquiries about cleaning them, in the late 1970s, led the then-principal to a complete set, installed in the early 1980s. The project cost close to $25,000 dollars, but the wood framing and protective glass, as well as the price of the murals, was all paid for by community support: it did not cost the Mexico School District one penny.
