Isabel Álvarez-Borland
Bridget Franco

Painting Borges Exhibit & the Spanish Curriculum

      The Painting Borges: Art Interpreting Literature exhibit at the Cantor Gallery has enjoyed tremendous success in connecting to multiple courses at various levels of the Spanish curriculum. In addition to the aforementioned Sophomore Honors course, Professor Álvarez-Borland created El Legado de Borges (Borges's Legacy), an advanced Spanish seminar that relates directly to these paintings inspired by Borges's short stories. The following essays by Randolph Escobar, Emily Polacek and Martha Espinal are representative of the interdisclipinary work being done in the seminar.

     In addition, there have been a variety of assignments and activities across the Spanish curriculum that have responded to the exhibit's unique interplay of visual art and literature. After students from Professor Esther Levine's Advanced Composition & Conversation class attended the standing room only Opening Reception with curator Jorge Gracia as well as Carlos Estevez's artist talk, they discussed their impressions of the paintings and made an interesting comparison between La otra - éramos demasiado parecidos y demasiado distintos and Mamacita, the protagonist of Sandra Cisneros' short story "No Speak English" (The House on Mango Street). In mid-February, five Holy Cross students (Emily Polacek, Elena Rogliano, Daiana Rua, Katharine Shapleigh, and Nicole Solman) conducted 30-minute tours in Spanish that were attended by dozens of students from 300 and 400-level Spanish classes. Professors Freear-Papio and Franco asked their Introduction to Literary Genres classes to write reflection papers about the two paintings inspired by Borges's short story "El sur" which they had previously analyzed in class. Professor Cibreiro-Couce brought her Body and Text: Representations of Gender in Modern Spanish Literature class to the exhibit and one of her students gave a presentation on two paintings that explore the female perspective of identity. Finally, several students from Professor Shaw's Composition and Conversation class visited the gallery as part of their required extracurricular activities.

     According to Roger Hankins, Director of the Cantor Gallery, the Borges exhibition has been one of the most attended exhibits (by both students and the general public) that the gallery has presented in several years. The many ways in which this exhibit has made connections across disciplines cannot be underestimated, as it has truly facilitated interaction with works of art among a wide range of students from a variety of majors. The Painting Borges: Art Interpreting Literature exhibit was originally shown at Pontificia Universidad Católica in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Next the exhibit will travel to Latino Arts in Milwaukee, WI; then the Speck Gallery, Texas A&M University; the Abud Family Foundation for the Arts, Trenton, NJ; the American University Museum, Washington D.C.; and finally the Anderson Gallery at the University at Buffalo.