POST-SHOW ROUNDTABLE: FORNÉS & SOUTH FLORIDA

Hosted by Lillian Manzor, PhD, University of Miami

Featuring relatives, friends and colleagues of María Irene Fornés: Yovani Bauta (visual artist), Rafael Fornés (architect and nephew of Irene) and Beatriz Rizk, PhD (independent scholar).

Fornés immigrated to the United States from Cuba by way of Miami, a city she returned to throughout her life, including an extended period towards the end of her life. As a result, Fornes has meaningful ties to the city, including a living community of relatives and artists devoted to preserving her legacy. The roundtable will highlight Fornés’ immigration to Miami from Cuba in 1945 and her various visits and projects in Miami.

This panel will also demonstrate the critical role that collective archiving, primary research, and biography play in preserving people’s legacy. Fornés immigrated to the United States from Cuba by way of Miami, a city she returned to throughout her life, including an extended period towards the end of her life. As a result, Fornes has meaningful ties to the city, including a living community of relatives and artists devoted to preserving her legacy. The roundtable will highlight Fornes’ immigration to Miami from Cuba in 1945 and her various visits

The Roundtable will take place directly after the 3:00pm matinee performance of Tango Palace.

ABOUT THE PANELISTS

Dr. Lillian Manzor is Associate Professor of Modern Languages and Literatures and Hemispheric Caribbean Studies at the University of Miami and Founding Director of the Cuban Theater Digital Archive (www.cubantheater.org). She is series coeditor of Sualos, published by Havana’s Editorial Alarcos and Miami’s CTDA Press. She is widely published in Latin American and Latinx theater and performance studies. She has coedited Latinas on Stage, Teatro cubano actual: dramaturgia escrita en los Estados Unidos, and coauthored Cuban Theater in Miami: 1960-1980 (http://scholar.library.miami.edu/miamitheater/) and El Ciervo Encantado: An Altar in the Mangrove (http://ciervoencantado.tome.press/). Her book Marginality Beyond Return: US-Cuban Performances and Politics is forthcoming with Routledge July 2022. Her research has been funded the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, National Endowment for the Humanities, American Council of Learned Societies, Ford Foundation, and Rockefeller Foundation. As a community engaged scholar, she has fostered US-Cuba cultural dialogues through theater and performance since 1993.

Yovani Bauta is an American artist living and working in Miami, Florida born in Havana, Cuba. A member of Board of International Association of Hispanic Visual Artist (IAHVA). President of Color Alternative Foundation for Visual and Performance Art. Yovani Bauta graduated from the National School of Arts in Havana, Cuba, as Professor of Painting and Drawing. He also has a Law Degree from the University of Matanzas, Cuba. His artwork has been exhibited in many countries such as Germany, France, Mexico, Spain, Switzerland and the United States, as well as in Cuba. His work has been reviewed and published in different art magazines and books in Mexico, France, and the United States. Mr. Bauta has lectured at the New School of Social Research, in New York; at Florida International University; and at the University of Michigan, among other academic institutions. A recent resume of his exhibitions includes: Museum of Art, Geneva, Switzerland; Museum of Latin American Art (MOLAA), Long Beach, California; Museo de las Americas, Madrid, Spain; Museo Maria Zambrano, Velez-Malaga, Spain; LOWE Art Museum, U. M., Coral Gables, Florida; Arizona State University, Phoenix, Arizona; University of Colorado Springs, Colorado and Miami Dade College, Miami, Florida.

Dr. Beatriz J. Rizk, Professor, critic, promoter, and researcher, Beatriz has edited seven issues of Tramoya on Latino and Latin American theaters. Her books include: Posmodernismo y teatro en América Latina: Teorías y prácticas en el umbral del siglo XXI (2001); Teatro y diáspora. Testimonios escénicos latinoamericanos. (2002); Imaginando un Continente: Utopía, democracia y neoliberalismo en el teatro latinoamericano (2 Vols, 2010); and 25 Years Celebrating Hispanic Culture in the United States: The International Hispanic Theatre Festival of Miami (2013). She is Senior Fellow of the Smithsonian Institute, Washington, DC She directs the IHTFs Education Program and is a member of Teatro Avante.

Rafael Fornés was born and raised in Havana, Fornes graduated from the CUJAE in 1981 and worked on several projects in his native Cuba. After immigrating to Hungary, Fornes moved to Miami in 1992 and came to know several prominent Cuban-American architects, including Andres Duany, lecturer at the School of Architecture. Duany and former Dean of the UM School of Architecture Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, both highly influential architects, are credited with launching the New Urbanism movement.

ABOUT THE PLAY: TANGO PALACE
TCT’s first production at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts will be TANGO PALACE, an early play by the late great master playwright and Pulitzer nominee, María Irene Fornés (1930-2018). A nine-time Obie Award winner, Fornés was a prolific author of nearly forty plays, a pioneer of the 1960’s Off-Off Broadway movement, and an originator of site-specific and immersive theatre. In TANGO PALACE, written in late 1962 and first staged in 1963 in San Francisco, Fornés reveals her indebtedness to Samuel Beckett's absurdism, Oscar Wilde's wit, and a modern camp style that her one-time lover Susan Sontag captured in her landmark essay, “Notes on Camp.”
TANGO PALACE, a dark, funny, and whimsical examination of perilous passion, tests the limits of the age-old saying that 'all is fair in love and war.’ When TANGO PALACE premiered, it was so successful that Arthur Ballet quickly anthologized it in Playwrights for Tomorrow.

TANGO PALACE will resonate with anyone who's ever tangoed with a tumultuous lover and lived to tell.

***Funding for this program was provided through a grant from Florida Humanities with funds from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Any views, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed by Thinking Cap Theatre do not necessarily represent those of Florida Humanities or the National Endowment for the Humanities.***