Poetas y Pintores: Artists Conversing with Verse

Twelve Visual Artists Engage

With The Work of Twelve Poets

A Chain of Intercambios

This exhibit was born of a series of dialogues: National Endowment for the Arts Chairman Dana Gioia visited the University of Notre Dame in 2003 and, in informal conversation with Notre Dame’s Institute for Latino Studies (ILS) staff, made it clear that the NEA had special interest in fostering artistic conversations. Especially attractive were projects that spurred meaningful exchange between disciplines. With this cue in mind, the Institute for Latino Studies, through ILS Fellow and poet Francisco Aragón, entered into dialogue with the Center for Women’s InterCultural Leadership (CWIL) at Saint Mary’s College, through CWIL Fellow and poet María Meléndez. The result? Poetas y Pintores: Artists Conversing with Verse.

Our aim, however, was not to promote “conversation” in predictable ways. Our deep conviction was that there was, already, a distinguished body of Latino poetry that merited a wider, more varied audience—including greater visibility in the arts community. This led us to conceive of the exhibit’s genesis as a dialogue between the visual artist and a pre-existing text, rather than a collaborative between the artists and the poets themselves.

Early in the brainstorming process our project steering committee grew to include, necessarily, colleagues with extensive arts backgrounds who, in effect, became co-curators: Marianne Farina, CSC (CWIL Co-Coordinator and graphic artist), Brookes Ebetsch (Assistant Arts Project Manager at ILS and artist), and, of course, Gilberto Cárdenas (Director of ILS and renowned collector of Latino art). With the support of an NEA grant and strong backing from both Saint Mary’s College and the University of Notre Dame, we selected twelve artists and twelve poets as project participants. Selections were made with the idea that contemporary Latino arts, rather than hewing to any one particular aesthetic, reveal an incredible dynamism through the variety of styles, tastes and techniques present in their work.

After each artist was sent a book published by one of the twelve project poets, the twelve selected artists were given no directives save two: they were challenged to create an original piece and choose one poem they found particularly inspiring to be printed and exhibited beside their work. Not surprisingly, there was a multiplicity of responses. Some artists chose not to have any contact with their poet. Others phoned their literary counterpart to ask them to speak about their work. One poet, at the artist’s request, provided an audio recording of himself reading his work. One artist interviewed her writer in person.

The desire to have each artist hone in on one poem also produced mixed results. A number of artists fashioned their work based on a group of poems and left it to us to choose one, refusing to do so themselves. Others chose one poem while underscoring that more than one inspired their piece. And so on. Visitors are encouraged to speculate for themselves what sparks of inspiration might have ignited, and explore what aspects are brought to the poem by the visual work displayed beside it.

Our hope is that through this interplay of image and the written word, a glimpse of a distinct, though certainly not definitive, representation of today’s US Latino community

has emerged. Equally important is that you, gentle visitor, enjoy the show and seek out, for further enjoyment, the work of these poets and artists. For those who do not have the exhibit on hand, we invite you to inquire how Poetas y Pintores: Artists Conversing with Verse might come to a gallery, museum, or community-based organization near you.

Francisco Aragón, ILS María Meléndez, CWIL Brookes Ebetsch, ILS

University of Notre Dame Saint Mary’s College University of Notre Dame

faragon@nd.edu melendezpoetry@gmail.com bebetsch@nd.edu

Reviews and Publicity

Specifications and Installation Photos (pdf1) (pdf2)

CWIL · 9 Havican Hall · Saint Mary's College · Notre Dame, IN · 46556-5001 · Phone: (574) 284-4051 · Fax: (574) 284-4141 · E-mail:

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