Founded in 1992, the Mexican Cultural Center (MCC) has two primary goals: to increase cultural diplomacy through the United States and Mexico and to uplift and elevate Mexican culture in Denver (and beyond).
“We’re a small but mighty team,” says MCC Executive Director Rachel Garcia. Currently a team of just five people, they hope to increase that number as they continue to grow in the coming years.
Existing programming revolves primarily around events with a (for now) secondary focus on education. Garcia estimates that MCC puts on somewhere between 15 and 20 events annually — although the exact number of programs depends on team capacity in any given year. Partners include the Denver Museum of Nature & Science and other Denver cultural institutions like the Denver Public Library, Colorado Symphony and Denver Botanic Gardens.
“It’s a blessing for us because it means that we can open the doors of those great institutions to our community through these programs,” says Garcia.
The first of these is Día del Niño, which always takes place the last weekend of April at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. MCC runs multiple programs with the museum throughout the year, and Día del Niño is their largest, drawing between 10,000 and 15,000 people for this one-day event each year.
“We work with various organizations and institutions around Denver and in Boulder,” Garcia says. “All of our programming is free to the public, and most of the organizations we partner with offer that as well.”
The programming that is not free, such as the IMAX theater and planetarium at Denver Museum of Nature & Science, is offered at a discounted rate. The end result?
“It provides access to communities that don’t always have access to those spaces,” says Garcia.
These spaces are absolutely not limited to Mexican and Latino Denverites.
“What’s really interesting is, for the Día del Niño events, I would say we have a great mix of all different cultures there,” adds Garcia. “In Latino cultures, children are a true part of the family. Their voices matter. They’re revered.”
Because of this, MCC makes a specific effort to reach out to students throughout Denver Public Schools regardless of cultural background, providing invitations in multiple languages when translators are available to the schools. As a result, Día del Niño has an intentionally broad audience.
Another cornerstone of MCC’s programming is an annual concert called Latin Beats: Sonidas de las Americas — which, like Día del Niño, has been celebrating Mexican culture in Denver for more than two decades. This unique concert incorporates the musical traditions of Mexico, such as Ballet Folklorico and mariachi, with the music of the Colorado Symphony, as well as Mexican and Latino talent from around the Denver metro area.
“We like to bring a lot of local talent,” says Garcia. “Then we have a small portion of the concert that’s dedicated to another Latin American country — Cuba, Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela… their music and their dance is how we usually incorporate that.”
Latin Beats takes place every September in Denver. MCC’s mission is to give Latinos in Denver and Colorado “a sense of belonging, a place where they are respected, and their culture is respected.”
In addition to other programs, an aspect of MCC’s work includes hosting workshops on aspects of Mexican culture (like Día de Los Muertos) around the Denver metro area and beyond — including places like Greeley and Thornton. These workshops include practical lessons on creating traditional folk art (such as butterflies or paper flowers, or altars themselves) and lessons on the significance of those things and why the celebration takes place.
“It’s not just for the Latino community. A lot of these instances, we’re educating people on things they want to know about,” says Garcia. “So in that way, we’re keeping our culture alive and providing pride in our cultural heritage.”
The MCC has worked hard to preserve and present Mexican culture in a way that’s both elevated, modernized and true to the traditions it comes from — which is no small task.
“I’m always looking to the future and what’s happening now,” says Garcia. “How do we modernize things that are a thousand years old? So what I just love is that people get to see their culture in a way that they don’t necessarily always see it. Especially in the Southwest, there’s a tendency to Americanize or anglicize our culture. ‘Cinco de Drinko’ and things like that,” Garcia pauses. “Yes, we love to have fun and we can throw a celebration like nobody’s business, but it’s what’s behind it that’s important to us. And that’s what we at the Mexican Cultural Center strive to preserve.”
The passion behind these words is palpable.
“My favorite thing is being able to be part of an institution that presents culture in a positive and respectful way that really instills cultural pride in all Latinos. And that people who are not Latino can look at it and say that it’s really beautiful — that they learned something from it. That’s my favorite thing,” says Garcia.
Reaching past cultural borders and connecting to others despite differences is crucial to the spirit of MCC’s work — even when it isn’t their program. On the day she was interviewed for this blog post, Garcia was at Denver Botanic Gardens observing an installation they have of eight bridges purchased from a workshop in Oaxaca.
“As I’m walking around, I’m watching children react to that,” she says. “Most of the people here are not Latino. Watching everybody react [to the bridges] and see all the colors and patterns and all of that[...] Even if they don’t read the plaque and see that it’s from Mexico or Oaxaca, people still appreciate something so beautiful. And we have so much pride in that.”
The MCC is funded primarily by grants, but individual donations come in as well — and those donations are often incredibly personal.
“’Colorado Gives’ Day comes around[…] people leave some money in memory of their Abuelita or brother or sister. We receive such beautiful notes of recognition for people in memoriam. They see what we’re doing and it sparks joy, and that is behind everything we do in the arts. And the joy we feel with art is something that I want to gift to everyone.”
MCC plans to continue expanding its programming in the near future.
“We’d love to build out more of our education programs,” says Garcia. “We’d like to be more involved with children in schools, and really creating that sense of pride at a younger age — as well as educating non-Latinos at a younger age so we recognize that we’re just mirrors of each other. There’s people who look like you and are respected just like you, and there are people who are not like you but deserve the same amount of respect.”
What's the best way to support MCC’s work? By attending these events and participating firsthand.