The Catalan Center at New York University, Spring 2010

This semester The Catalan Center at New York University invites you to celebrate the ongoing presence in New York City of a thriving Catalan artistic community.

Catalan art and design have been present in NY since Rafael Guastavino executed the foundations of Grand Central Station or Salvador Dalí held court at the St. Regis. This semester we will explore Dalí’s influence on dance and art in a symposium at Queens College and NYU.

The current community of CatalaNYC artists includes every artistic discipline. This semester we will focus on two filmmakers who developed their work in the city. Xavi Marrades received his MFA at the School of Visual Arts, and Xavi Menós, at New School University. The Center also hopes to contribute in a—literally—small way to NY film by inviting Alberto Tognazzi and Mar Cordobés, Barcelona-based experts in new technologies, to offer a workshop on cell phones in art and activism.

New York, where Pau Casals and Montserrat Caballé have long been familiar names, is also embracing contemporary Catalan music. Benet Casablancas will have his NY debut at The Miller Theatre and we will have a chance to meet the composer at the Casa Italiana at NYU.

Echoes of the Catalan past will be heard at the Center for Jewish History when Sílvia Planas tells us the story of Jewish women’s daily life in 13th century Girona, while the influence of Jewish culture on contemporary Catalan writing will be explored by Manuel Forcano. And a new crop of translations is giving Catalan writers a place on the NY literary scene: in February we will highlight Jaume Cabré’s Winter Journey.

Moving from the arts to the public arena, in March, we will welcome one of the privileged actors and witnesses to contemporary Catalan history and policy: the Honorable Jordi Pujol, President of the Generalitat of Catalonia from 1980-2003, will address trans-Atlantic relations in “Europe and the United States in Today’s World”.