By popular request, the CCCNY is streaming all chapters of Gloria Rolando‘s seminal film on the Oblate Sisters of Providence. Hermanas de corazón is a fascinating three-part documentary on the educational mission of the Oblate Sisters throughout the first half of the 20th century in Cuba. The first order of black nuns in the world, it was founded against all odds in Baltimore, Maryland in 1829. Their admirable legacy on the Island had been all but lost until disinterred by Gloria Rolando. The first two parts were presented during our annual Summer Film Festival last year. In this special cinematic installment, and in celebration of Black History Month, we will be streaming Part 3 as well.
Following the screening of Part 3 on Wednesday, there will be a Q&A with the director, Gloria Rolando, moderated by Afro-Cuban Studies scholar Adriana Méndez Rodenas, of our History Program.
To attend, click below on the scheduled date and time:
Tuesday 7:30 pm ~ Parts 1 and 2: https://vimeo.com/event/4945667/653f79dabf
Wednesday 7:30 pm ~ Part 3: https://vimeo.com/event/4946943/325f6adcf8
To participate in the Q&A via Zoom after the screening of Part 3 on Wednesday, click here:
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89526024766
This special two-nights-only screening is part of our CreateNYC Language Access Series on Cuban History, Art, and Literature. The film is in Spanish with English subtitles.
Gloria Rolando is a Cuban filmmaker and screenwriter. Her career as a director
spans more than 35 years, first at the Cuban national film institute (ICAIC), and later as head of Imágenes del Caribe, an independent film-making group. Her documentaries characteristically relate the plight of the African diaspora, with a particular focus on the history of black Cubans. Among her best known works are Cuba, My Footsteps in Baraguá (1996), a history of the West Indian community in eastern Cuba, The Jazz in Us (2004), and a three-part series on the 1912 massacre of members of the Partido Independiente de Color (Independent Party of Color), entitled Breaking the Silence (2010). Her most recent documentaries include Reembarque (2014), the story of Haitian immigrants to Oriente in the early 20th century and their forced repatriation after the sugar market crashed, and Dialog with My Grandmother (2016), based on a 1993 conversation she had with her grandmother, Inocencia Leonarda Armas y Abre. She’s presently working on a new documentary on the Buffalo Soldiers in Cuba in the late 1800’s.
Adriana Méndez Rodenas is Professor Emerita of Latin American and Comparative Literatures at the University of Iowa. At the University of Missouri, she was past director of the Afro-Romance Institute and is now an emerita professor of Spanish. She has written amply on Cuban literature, including her signature book, Gender and Nationalism in Colonial Cuba: The Travels of Santa Cruz y Montalvo, Condesa de Merlin (1998). Her chapter on Merlin’s Colonial Havana appeared in The Palgrave Handbook of Transnational Women’s Writing in the Long Nineteenth Century (2023). Her latest article reinterprets Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda for The Cambridge History of Cuban Literature (2024). A specialist in travel writing, she resurrected the stories of Victorian “lady” travelers in Transatlantic Travels to Nineteenth Century Latin America: European Women Pilgrims (2014). Among prestigious grants and awards, she received the NEH (National Endowment for the Humanities) and the Fulbright Distinguished Chair of American Studies at Uppsala University (2008-2009). Her dedication to the art of Ana Mendieta has resulted in lectures delivered at various universities and conferences.
This event is being presented in celebration of Black History Month, and is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts and the New York State Legislature.
With the promotional cooperation of 14yMedio, Rialta, and Diario de Cuba
