by Antonio Mejías-Rentas
An scene of the film Stellet licht, by Mexican filmmaker Carlos Reygadas
OSCAR SHUT-OUT: No Spanish-language films will be listed in the Foreign Language category when Academy Award nominees are announced this week.
The Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences revealed this month a short list of nine possible nominees to be voted on by a special committee. They were culled from a total of 63 submissions At least five of them will be selected.
A single film from Latin America is among nine contenders: the Portuguese language O ano em que mous pais sairam de ferias (The year my parents went on vacation), submitted by Brazil.
Spanish-language films submitted for consideration included several festival favorites, none more prominent than Spain’s El orfanato (The orphanage) from debuting director Juan Antonio Bayona. Now screening nationally, the fi lm (produced by Mexico’s Gabriel Del Toro) may still contend in other Oscar categories.
Also absent from the list are Mexico’s Stellet licht (spoken in a German dialect used by Mexican Mennonites) from Carlos Reypadas and XXY, the 6Argentinian entry from Luisa Puenzo, daughter of Oscar-winner Luis Puenzo.
The Spanish language may not be completely absent. A ditty penned by Shakira for the film Love in the Time of Cholera has qualified for consideration in the Best Original Song category.
Nominations are to be announced Jan. 22 in Los Angeles.
PHILLY FRIDA: Two rarely-seen, privately-owned paintings are prominent in an exhibition opening next mont:h in Philadelphia to mark the centennial of one of Mexico’s best-known artists.
Carlos Reypadas
Titled Frida Kahlo, it opens Feb. 20 at the Philadelphia Art Museum, where it will be seen through May 18. It is being touted as the most ambitious U.S. exhibition on the Mexican artists in 15 years.
The show includes the paintings Yo y mis pericos (1941) and Magnolias (1939), exhibited for the first time, as well as several iconic Kahlo works never shown before in this country, including Las dos Fridas (1939) and the portrait Diego y Frida (1944).
Frida Kahlo was seen through Jan. 20 at the WalkerArt Center in Minneapolis and afier Philadelphia, the exhibition will travel to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (June 16 September 28).
The Philadelphia museum will also show, Feb. 16 to May 11, an exhibition devoted to Mexican painter Juan Soriano, who died in 2006 at 86. Demonio fragil: Juan Soriano en Mexico is thefirst major U.S. exhibition by the antist. Hispanic Link.
(For an expanded version of this column, visit hispaniclink.org).
