An 18th century exhibit that speaks to 21st century L.A.

Sporting a silk pocket square and tie in shades of yellow -- for good luck -- Mexico City art dealer Rodrigo Rivero Lake swirled some amber whiskey in a sparkling tumbler. Time to celebrate. Not only did he have a rare four-panel screen in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art’s new exhibit “Inventing Race: Casta Painting and Eighteenth-Century Mexico,” but he was about to mingle at the opening with guests such as investor Javier Baz, philanthropist William H. Ahmanson and arts activist Andrea Van de Kamp.

Although his 17th century work depicting people engaged in pre-Columbian games at an Indian wedding did not fit the genre of Colonial Mexican paintings, it was placed at the entrance to provide a conceptual framework for the show. “My artworks are like my sons,” he said, relaxing on the breeze-swept museum plaza. “I love them so much that I have to show them.”

Baz was one of the first to tour the exhibit of 110 works, many on copper, that exemplify what show curator Ilona Katzew called “a celebration of race-mixing in Mexico, New Spain.” “This art, a very particular type, is fabulous -- revealing and educational,” Baz observed, joining Lake for a discussion of the exhibit. Did they know why some of the women in the paintings were portrayed with large black moles on their foreheads? “Nobility! Nobility!” they chimed. “They used to glue them on,” Lake explained, “to show their place.”

Patiently answering questions as 700 guests toured the show, Katzew, the museum’s associate curator of Latin American art, explained that the works were like a collection of “postcards, if you will.” The paintings by Colonial Mexican artists were executed in response to European curiosity. “There was a tremendous hunger for knowledge about what set the New World apart, and of course, one of the distinctions was race-mixing,” she said. With mixing among Spaniards, Mexican Indians and African slaves, a racially diverse society developed. “I think there could be no better city than L.A. to showcase these paintings,” she said. “If anything, these paintings can get us talking about what it is that makes L.A. unique.”

For Dannielle Campos, a vice president of Bank of America, a sponsor, touring the exhibit made her feel “proud, very proud, of my beginnings, my culture, my background. I took my time, studied every painting. And I hope that every Latino in L.A. takes the time to see it.”

-- Ann Conway