POR EL BIEN DE LA PATRIA HAY QUE PRODUCIR MÁS!

Guadalajara90210, Mexico City, 2022

Produce more sugar cane, cotton, and tobacco.
More tools, oil, and textiles.
Even more gum.
Poppies, too.

We must work in the fields, in the factories: exploit, produce, extract, import, and export. Little train speeding towards the city... to the industries, to the United States, and back.

Artist Josué Mejía presents an exhibition featuring various vignettes exploring the narratives Mexico embraced to become part of World War II. The notion of industrialization permeates this period, providing infrastructure and economic growth to a nation-state seeking to join the grand war event through production. Nacional Financiera provided loans to various industries to boost production, turning Mexico into a stockpile for the war; it would export various raw materials and goods to the United States.

Questioning Mexico's participation in the war is to question the role of industry and the images created through it. Perhaps it is also to wonder about President Ávila Camacho—what was he dreaming? What did he say, like, or desire? It is known that President Ávila Camacho enjoyed cinema, specifically Dumbo, an animated film produced by Walt Disney from the United States. Perhaps while watching Dumbo in his grand movie theater, he thought it might be a good idea for Mexico to move beyond being just a producer for the war. Maybe it was time for Mexico to play a more active role in this global history. Highly likely, he was inspired by Dumbo to send an air squadron on May 8, 1944, to the Pacific front to fight Japanese forces.

“For the good of the nation, we must produce more!” said President Ávila Camacho. Produce more films, and with the support and exchange with the U.S. government, the national film industry would grow exponentially to present and reinforce the values of early capitalism in Mexico and be disseminated throughout the country. Little train, when your whistle is heard at the station, everyone eagerly awaits not only goods but also various educational films that teach what it means to be Mexican and remind us of how good life is in America!

Carolina Díaz