More than 300 cultural, academic, culinary and artistic events are planned for the 2014 International Festival of Mayan Culture (FICMaya) from Oct. 17-26.
The festival will be spread all throughout Yucatan, from Merida to Progresso and to the Pueblos Magicos of Valladolid and Izamal.
Accompanied by the president of the National Council for Culture and the Arts (Conaculta), Rafael Tovar y de Teresa, Gov. Rolando Zapata Bello formally announced the festival before an audience of dignitaries at Mexico City’s National Museum of Anthropology. In the audience were writers Agustín Monsreal, Hernán Lara Zavala and Sara Poot, a reminder that book launches and literary events are on the agenda as well. The festival’s opening ceremony will be at the archaeological site of Dzibilchaltún and then everyone will move to the historic center to witness the ballet “Giselle” at the Teatro Jose Peon Contreras. Activities for children will be held at the Centro Cultural del Niño Yucateco in Mejorada.
But the main focus of this year’s festival is architecture.
“Architecture is one of the roots of Mexican culture and this focus will allow showing the richness of culture in its diversity and show one of the strongest expressions of universal culture. No wonder Mexico is the sixth country inscribed on the UNESCO cultural property,” the governor said.
The governor also said that this event helps to increase the tourist inflow in the typically slow month of October.
Lectures, symposiums, exhibitions and conferences will be led by writers, intellectuals and performers from Honduras, Belize, France, Germany, Russia, United States, Canada, Japan, Israel and South Korea, partly through an alliance with the International Cervantes Festival, running concurrently in Guanajuato.
The full schedule is on the FICMaya website.
Destaco la alianza del @ficmaya con el @Cervantino y la presencia de Guatemala y Campeche como invitados de honor. pic.twitter.com/J7r4UMgeul
— Rafael Tovar (@rtovarydeteresa) August 21, 2014
Temas @FicMaya “Los misteriosos estilos arquitectónicos mayas” pic.twitter.com/afm5YiVPHR
— FICMAYA (@FicMaya) August 21, 2014
