New Cuban-American art exhibit at the Frist Art Museum shows growth in representation
Greetings, amigos:
Modern Cuban-American artists' works are on display in Nashville right now.
The exhibit called "On the Horizon" is on loan to the Frist Art Museum from the Pérez Art Museum in Miami. The show opened on Jan. 28.
The works are bold and focus on numerous themes from challenging the oppressive Communist regime in Cuba to confronting systemic racism in the United States.
Among the artists featured is María Magdalena Campos-Pons, who is a professor at Vanderbilt University.
One of her pieces that moved me was called "Butterfly Eyes (for Breonna Taylor)," a mixed media print on archival paper honoring the Kentucky woman shot and killed in her apartment by police in 2020.
The exhibit is open through May 1 and worth your time to visit. It is one of the many ways of how representation of Latino art and culture is growing in Tennessee.
Plus, the museum is family-friendly with a room dedicated to children's activities.
In this week's newsletter, scroll to read the following
Tennessean education reporter Meghan Mangrum writes about efforts across Tennessee to ban books or remove them from the curriculum. This is part of a post-anti-critical race theory law that is leading local school boards to examine — and possibly purge — their libraries. Mangrum writes: "The books (Moms for Liberty Williamson chapter founder Robin) Steenman wants the state to reconsider include the autobiography of Ruby Bridges, the story of a Sylvia Mendez and her Latinx family's integration of Los Angeles public schools and a book on Martin Luther King Jr.'s March on Washington and legacy."
A guest essay by Robby Starbuck, a Latino Republican candidate for Congress who is hoping to replace Congressman Jim Cooper, D-Nashville, who recently announced his retirement. Starbuck's essay is about a new Contract with America, and he has received the endorsement of several prominent conservative politicians. A recent endorsement that eluded him, though, was that of former President Donald Trump, who gave his support to former staffer Morgan Ortagus.
A story by Maria Puente of USA TODAY about the new documentary "We Need to Talk About Cosby" that examines the legacy of formerly incarcerated comedian Bill Cosby.
Mabinty Quarshie of USA TODAY writes about how the recently passed federal infrastructure law will reconnect Latino and Black neighborhoods once divided by highway construction.
As a bonus, find Congressman Cooper's creative but profound obituary of Nashville's political life after his district was split in three.
¡Muchas gracias!
David Plazas is the director of opinion and engagement for the USA TODAY Network Tennessee. He is of Colombian and Cuban descent, has studied or worked in several Spanish-speaking countries, and was the founding editor of Gaceta Tropical in Southwest Florida. He has lived in Tennessee since 2014. Call him at (615) 259-8063, email him at dplazas@tennessean.com or tweet to him at @davidplazas.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: New Cuban-American art exhibit at the Frist Art Museum shows growth in representation
