Arts & Events Calendar

Sacred Cult, Subversive Icon: The Virgin of Guadalupe

Charlene Villasenor Black, Ph.D.

Wed, Sep 17, 2008 at 4:00pm

Roth Nelson Room - map

The Virgin of Guadalupe has played a number of roles in Mexican and Chicana/o cultures – object of religious devotion, emblem of national pride, symbol of peace and justice, even feminist signifier. Charlene Villaseñor Black will examine these transformations over the centuries, from the sacred icon of 1531 to recent controversies over and censorship of contemporary images.

Villaseñor Black is an associate professor and Director of Graduate Studies in UCLA’s Department of Art History, where she teaches courses on visual culture in Latin America and Spain as well as theory and method. She has published widely and has received numerous grants. Her book Creating the Cult of St. Joseph: Art and Gender in the Spanish Empire won the College Art Association Millard Meiss Award. In 2006, she co-organized with her graduate students the working group Visiones: Art and Activism in the Americas to foster dialogue between students, faculty, artists, activists and members of the community.

Admission is free. This event is made possible with a grant from the President’s Diversity Council and is sponsored by the Art Department in coordination with the Spanish and Religion departments and the Center for Equality and Justice.

Image: Virgin of Guadalupe, 1531. Courtesy of Charlene Villaseñor Black/UCLA Department of Art History