A Letter from Madrid, Where Impending Quarantine Permits a Last Look at Goya

In Times of Uncertainty, Art Is a Reminder That Beauty Can Endure

Just Before Madrid’s Quarantine Began, Getting a Last Look at Goya | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

The day the Spanish government announced a two-week closure of all schools and colleges in Madrid due to coronavirus, I was in Berkana, the city’s oldest gay bookstore, considering whether to buy a copy of Death in Venice by Thomas Mann. I’ve been living in Madrid since last October, when I moved here from Venezuela to study in a Master’s program organized by El País, Spain’s top newspaper. Since then, I have gotten in the habit of going to a bookstore to browse around for an hour or two whenever …

by José González Vargas | March 20, 2020

How Flamenco Explains Spain’s Complex Identity

The Music, Born of Gypsies in the Country’s South, Was Embraced by Foreigners Long Before It Became a National Symbol

by Sandie Holguín | October 24, 2019

During the 1964-1965 New York World’s Fair, an advertisement for the Bates textile company in the Pavilion of Spain’s official guide book featured a fetchingly posed young woman, rose in …

Why Simón Bolívar Isn’t the Only Revolutionary Icon Venezuelans Should Look Up To

Francisco de Miranda, a Quixotic Fighter for Liberty, Also Belongs in Our National Pantheon

by José González Vargas | July 10, 2018

In Philadelphia, there is only one statue dedicated to someone from Latin America. If you look among the monuments along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, you’ll eventually come across the statue …

Why John Quincy Adams Was the Founder of American Expansionism

An Ardent Believer in National Greatness, the Sixth President Thought America Should Dominate the Hemisphere

By William J. Cooper | February 26, 2018

As the son of John Adams, John Quincy knew most of the other Founders, including George Washington, and he had an abiding belief in the virtue of their handiwork. Declaring …

The Invention and Evolution of the Concentration Camp

From Cuba to South Africa, the Advent of Barbed Wire and Automatic Weapons Allowed the Few to Imprison the Many

By Andrea Pitzer | October 18, 2017

Before the first prisoner entered the Soviet Gulag, before “Arbeit macht frei” appeared on the gates of Auschwitz, before the 20th century had even begun, concentration camps found their first …

By Engaging Our Emotions, Art Can Strengthen Our Democracies

Music, Theater, Visual Art, and Cinema Help Us Shape Debate and Bolster Citizenship

By Fernando Pindado Sanchez | June 22, 2017

Can the arts be a stimulus for democracy? The question may seem strange because, in principle, there does not seem to be a relationship between the arts and democracy. What …

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