Although film, music and theater remain the International Latino Cultural Center’s three strongest programming pillars, the lack of a permanent home for the ILCC has made it impossible for the organization to consistently program, for example, art exhibitions, culinary events, and even literary presentations (we could not find in our archives any evidence of any literary event such as poetry readings and conferences that the ILCC might have presented or co-presented since its name change). The ILCC did solidify its dance programming through the annual Chicago Latino Dance Festival, a three to four day showcase of over 20 local Latino and Spanish dance companies held weekly throughout the city in the fall.

What follows is a quick overview of the many other events presented and co-presented by the ILCC these past 25 years:

VISUAL ARTS

Founded in in 1993 Chicago’s River North neighborhood, a gallery hot spot at the time, by Nicaraguan artist, dealer and curator Aldo Castillo, the Aldo Castillo Gallery quickly established a high benchmark in the curation and exhibition of Latin American and Iberian art in Chicago, so it made perfect sense that the International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago would join forces with the gallery.

The first collaboration we have a record of took place in 2000 when the Aldo Castillo Gallery and the 16th annual Chicago Latino Film Festival presented The Mexican Golden Age of Cinematography: Photographs by Gabriel Figueroa, a selection of mostly black and white stills from the films shot by the Golden Globe-winning legendary cinematographer. The exhibit was held from March 29-April 22, 2000.

Two years later, both organizations presented an exhibit of Alejandro Quijano’s recent bronze sculptures with the title: Alejandro Quijano Without Masks from May 8-June 14. The exhibit was part of the International Guest Artists Program, a joint project of the ILCC and the Aldo Castillo Gallery which provided funding to emerging and established artists from selected Latin American countries and Spain to be able to show and promote their works in Chicago, to personally experience the cultural contributions of the city, and for all people to experience a one of a kind exposure to the universality of the arts.

The following month, the ILCC and Aldo Castillo Gallery brought together four members of the Uruguayan Foundation for the Arts for the exhibit Uruguayan Art Today (July 12-27, 2002): figurative painter Elisa Armendariz; painter Ana Méndez (whose work is inspired by the work of Jorge Luis Borges); the daydream like mixed media work of Martín Mendizábal; and Juan Pedro Paz.

In 2005 and every two years after that (until 2009), the ILCC and Aldo Castillo presented 3+3=6: Three Men, Three Women, Six Countries, a showcase dedicated to the most influential Latin American and Spanish artists. The four exhibits (August 5-31, 2005; July 18-August 30, 2007; August 10-September 1, 2007; and July 31-August 28, 2009) we have record of featured such renowned artists and diverse styles and approaches as Maria Bonomi’s (Brazil) monumental engravings, Haydee Victoria Suescum’s (Panamá) spin on the many hand-painted signs encountered in the Spanish-speaking areas of the United States; Haitian Fritz Millevoix’s’ naive or primitive style paintings featuring mountain village scenes, underwater mermaid villages, and Caribbean beach scenes; theatre and film set designer Gunther Gerzso (Mexico); and Miguel Gómez, whose paintings pay homage to the color, the dance and the carnival culture of his native Dominican Republic.

After accepting the role of assistant art director for the Miami International Art Fair in 2010, Aldo Castillo closed the doors of his River North gallery and relocated to Naples, where he opened a brand new gallery and continued his mission of positioning the work of contemporary Latin American and Spanish artists in  the international arts market.

We found one more photo exhibit presented by the ILCC outside of its collaborations with the Aldo Castillo Gallery. Held between April 3-14, 2000 at the atrium of what was then the James R. Thompson Center and is today the future downtown Chicago headquarters of Google, the Solmares Photography Exhibition showcased a number of photos of the Mexican Revolution by photographer Agustín Víctor Casasola, featuring images of Francisco I. Madero’s presidential campaign and the signing of the 1917 Mexican Constitution. 

NUESTRO FOLKLORE

What would a culture be, or even mean, without its traditions?

They provide stability, meaning, identity and community to a whole village, town, or even country. Those traditions may evolve, may even be re-invented but no matter how much you recombine its DNA, the essence still remains. 

Tradition has never been far behind in the ILCC’s programming, even as it partnered with galleries or organized classical music events and festivals. So whenever the opportunity was there to feature one of our many traditional dances and dance ensembles or storytellers and even musicians, the ILCC did not think twice about it.

On July 19, 2000, the ILCC, with Lake Michigan as a spectacular backdrop, proudly presented Folkloric Dances of Colombia at Navy Pier’s Skyline Stage. Formed in 1954 by Delia Zapata Olivella to preserve the customs and traditions of Colombia, the company’s program showcased the diversity of the country’s musical and dance expressions: from the waltz-like el pasillo to el joropo and the ritualistic dances of mapalé. Alas, this would be one of the company’s final performances under Zapata Olivella’s direction; she passed away the following year. 

Other folk-related events produced by the ILCC that they have records for on their archives:

Aztec Stories (October 12, 2002): Held at West Side Technical Institute (now the Arturo Velázquez Institute), 2800 S. Western Ave., the all-family cultural, educational, musically interactive presentation featured storyteller, musician and poet Michael Heralda who told stories about the legacy of the tortilla and the meanings of Xochitl and Kuikatl, among others.

Carnaval Ponceño (July 26, 2003): Held at Roberto Clemente High School, 1147 N. Western Ave., in the mostly Puerto Rican neighborhood of Humboldt Park, the event featured a performance of traditional dances and marches accompanied by bomba and plena rhythms provided by Africaribe.

Niños del Vallenato (July 20, 2005): An extraordinary troupe of children from Valledupar, Colombia, whose ages range from 6 to 18 years and who play the accordions, sing and dance, performed at the Merle Reskin Theatre.

FUNDRAISERS

The 25th anniversary dinner celebration of the ILCC at CineCity Studios, 2429 West 14th St. on Friday, November 14 is the first true fundraiser the organization has held in more than a decade. But 20 years ago and for seven consecutive years, the International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago in association with the marketing and events agency Azúcar Enterprises celebrated Hispanic Heritage Month with a series of annual fundraisers titled Vive la Hispanidad.

Held first at Galleria Marchetti, 825 West Erie St., in the River North neighborhood, for several years before moving to the now shuttered Germania Place in the Old Town neighborhood, the multidisciplinary fundraising event featured a catered selection of traditional dishes from the city’s top Latin American restaurants; wines from Chile and Argentina; an art exhibit from Chicago’s top Latino artists; and music from local Latino groups including Mariachi Perla de México, Africaribe, Tierra Colombiana Folkloric Dance Company, Chicago Samba, and Cerqua Rivera Dance Company

FILM OUTSIDE THE FESTIVAL

We end right where we started…at the movies.

The Chicago Latino Film Festival may be the ILCC’s crown jewel but that didn’t stop the organization from screening films from the Pan-Latino diaspora when there was an opportunity to do so outside of the Festival, especially when, outside of the streaming services, the theatrical presentation of such films in this country is still minimal. 

On November 16, 2000, the ILCC kicked off a ten day retrospective of the films of Luis Buñuel in celebration of his birth’s centennial. The retrospective opened at the City North 14 Multiplex in Logan Square with the U.S. Premiere of The Prisoners of Buñuel by director Ramón Gieling, a documentary about how the residents of Las Hurdes feel about Buñuel’s controversial 1933 documentary Las Hurdes/Land Without Bread, more than 60 years after its making. The thirteen-film series then moved to Facets Film Forum and included such key titles as Los olvidados (1950), Nazarín (1958) The Exterminating Angel (1962), and The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972).

The ILCC celebrated another centennial four years later with another retrospective: Pablo Neruda’s. Titled Cien Años de Neruda: A Film Series and presented again at Facets from November 19-21, 2004 in cooperation with Columbia College Chicago, the UIC Rafael Contrón-Ortiz Latino Cultural Center and the Consulate General of Chile, the series included two documentaries by Luis R. Vera: Neruda, the Man and His Work (2004) and Viola Chilensis (2003), the most comprehensive documentary at the time on the life and work of another Chilean icon, singer-songwriter Violeta Parra. The series also included a special screening of Micharl Radford’s critically acclaimed Il Postino, about the friendship between Neruda and a local fisherman during the poet’s exile in Italy. 

For the past 17 years, the ILCC’s monthly Reel Film Club series has featured, on the last Tuesday of the month from January to February and from May through November, selections from past festivals preceded by a networking reception featuring appetizers from the selected film’s country of origin and concluding with a post-screening discussion. The series has moved from venue to venue: from Facets to St. Augustine College to Instituto Cervantes and back at Facets. But this wasn’t the first pairing of food and film organized by the ILCC.

Back in 2002, the ILCC teamed up with Café Ba-Ba-Reeba, one of the oldest standing Spanish restaurants in the city, to present Cinema Sangría, a weekly showcase of Iberoamerican cinema held every Monday night from September through November. The program featured selections from current and past festivals; attendees could enjoy a buffet dinner of Spanish dishes followed by the film. Sounds familiar?

Then, in 2006, in partnership with the Chicago Parks District, the ILCC started taking the more family friendly fare of past festivals to different parks across the city, mostly in majority-Latino neighborhoods. Titled Films in the Park and presented as part of the Park District’s summer long Movies in the Park program, the series marked the first time foreign language films were screened outdoors in the city’s parks. Between five and nine films are screened each year, depending on the slots assigned by the city. The series provided families the opportunity to enjoy, free of charge, films that they otherwise would not have the chance to see in a setting that lends itself to community building.

Although the ILCC is strongly committed to continuing such free programs as Films in the Park, the Chicago Latino Dance Festival and many of the concerts it presents free of charge throughout the year, the reality is that the organization has seen a significant reduction in the attendance of such events. Because of the recent indiscriminate ICE raids in our communities, most of our audiences are now afraid to come out, endangering the future of these and so many other events produced by our fellow arts organization. Which is why this year-round fundraising campaign is so important to the organization. The ILCC is also currently looking at different ways to broaden its audience outside of its traditional enclaves. The organization strongly believes that by bringing new audiences to the fold, they not only will be combating the many prejudices against and misconceptions about the community but these new audiences will find common ground with the Latino community through these events.

HERE’S HOW YOU CAN HELP:

As part of its fundraising campaign commemorating its 25th anniversary, the International Latino Cultural Center will be hosting a dinner celebration at CineCity Studios, 2429 West 14th St. on Friday, November 14, featuring a solo performance from Grammy® and Latin Grammy® Award winning artist Alex Cuba and the very best in Latino cuisine. Doors open at 6 p.m. For more information, visit the ILCC’s official fundraising dinner page. 

Unable to make the event? Never fear, you can still be part of our campaign with your individual contribution. Every single bit helps our mission to preserve in the city of Chicago a space for Pan-Latino arts in all its glorious disciplines. For more information on individual giving visit our individual giving page.

The International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago is a 501(3)(c) nonprofit cultural organization. All contributions are tax-deductible to the full extent allowed by the law.

“It’s important that our stories be told as honestly as possible and that they be authentic voices that are speaking from the heart,” playwright, filmmaker and founder of Teatro Campesino Luis Valdez told a reporter from KSBW Action News in Monterey, California in 2021.

Of all the seven programming pillars of the International Latino Cultural Center, theater is the one that best exemplifies Valdez’s beliefs. Live theater allows audiences to immediately perceive if an actor or playwright is being honest to themselves and to the stories they are telling. Actors can create the illusion they are speaking directly to their audiences. Actors can immediately feel the acceptance or reproach of their audiences. That interaction alone creates an energy that is unique. And unlike movies, where performances are forever set on celluloid or digital, actors can feed on that energy and deliver a performance that may be slightly different each night.

A month and a half run of Rick Najera’s Latinologues: Comedy with no Borders is the earliest record we have in our archives of a theatrical performance presented by the International Latino Cultural Center post-name change. Coming off a nine month run in Los Angeles, the play, written and starring Najera (a former writer for the Wayans’ family Fox comedy show In Living Color) and co-starring actor Jacob Vargas (American Me, Mi Familia and Selena), was staged at the Victory Gardens Theater in Lincoln Park from February 4-April 2, 2000. A Mexican Moses who promises to take his followers to the promised land of Chicago; a gay Latino producer trying to convince a chicano scriptwriter to work on a project about Hernán Cortez; and a Mexican-American agent of la migra were among the characters portrayed by Najera, Vargas and their weekly guests from LA’s improv and theatrical circuits.

A month-long run of Cuban-American playwright and actress Carmen Pelaez’s first one-woman show, Rum & Coke, directed by Susan V. Booth (currently the Walter Artistic Director at the Goodman Theatre) followed. Sponsored by the ILCC in cooperation with Columbia College Chicago and presented by Pegasus Players (now Pegasus Theatre Chicago) from September 13-October 22, 2000 at Truman College’s O’Rourke Center in the Uptown neighborhood after a sold-out run in Miami, Rum & Coke centered on Camila, the U.S. born daughter of Cuban exiles, as she prepares for a trip to Havana. 

The ILCC presented another one woman show during that time: Cuban-Rican playwright Marga Gómez’s jaywalker at the Black Orchid Classic Night Club in Old Town. Performed on October 7, 2000, jaywalk pokes fun at the film and television industry’s stereotyping of Latinos as it traces Marga’s quest on becoming the first Lesbian to be cast on the then popular television series Baywatch.

The following year, the Center brought to Chicago from Honduras Teatro La Fragua’s production of Romero de las Américas, to the Getz Theatre of Columbia College from September 28-30, 2001. The play, originally written by Carlos Morton as The Savior, and re-written in 1998 with members of La Fragua, uses traditional dances as well as corridos, rock music, and a minimalist set design to tell the story of how Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero became the voice for human rights in his country and all of Central America until he was assassinated by in 1980 while giving mass by members of a death squad. Still active, Teatro La Fragua was founded in Olanchito, Honduras in 1979 by Jack Warner, a Jesuit priest and graduate of Chicago’s Goodman Theater School (now the Theater School at DePaul) with the idea of awakening the people’s creativity to further empower and enrich them. The troupe is composed of young, marginalized men and women who developed their acting skills through a series of workshops. 

References to other theatrical productions can be found in Panorama, the ILCC’s quarterly newsletter mailed to members between 2000-2004. Three theatrical productions were announced in the Fall 2002 newsletter beginning with a program of two short plays produced by the local theater company Cuerda Flojas Arts Troupe led by actor Eduardo Von: El oso, based on Anton Chekhov’s story about a landowner who comes to collect an outstanding debt from a young widow; and Puros cuentos, an experimental theater piece based on three short stories by Octavio Paz, Juan Rulfo and Chekhov. The program was presented on September 13 and 15 at Teatro Luna’s space on 18th street in Pilsen.

(A word about Teatro Luna before we continue this trip through history. Founded in June 2000 by Coya Paz and Tanya Saracho, Teatro Luna was Chicago’s first full all-Latina theatre ensemble. For more than ten years, they staged original collective shows throughout the city and in their own space in Pilsen and later Lakeview. They also created programs that nurtured and trained Latinas in the art of playwriting, directing, acting and production. After trying to operate in both Los Angeles and Chicago, especially after so many of them found new opportunities on the West Coast, the company settled in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of L.A. and changed its name to Studio Luna where they continue to empower Latinas through workshops and performances.)

On September 20 and 21, 2002, the ILCC presented Chilean troupe Teatro del Puente’s production of Ojos rotos, the story of one woman’s dementia told through dance and song and based on Almudenas Grandes’ 1996 short story Modelos de mujer, at the Chicago Historical Society (now Chicago History Museum). Then from September 27-29, the ILCC presented Mujeres en la guerra, based on Colombian journalist Patricia Lara’s book about three women who have to deal with the legacy of Colombia’s Civil War. The play was staged at the Getz Theater but, unfortunately, there is no mention in the newsletter of the company responsible for its production.

Only one play was presented by the ILCC in 2003 (at least based on what is available in our archives): Argentinean theater group Tespico’s production Pagar el Pato: Tango para dos from August 1-3 at Columbia College Chicago’s Music Department. Written by Dino Armas, considered a master of the grotesque and absurd in Uruguay, Pagar el pato tells the story of Roma, a woman with a hideous and monstrous scar, and Omar, the man who seeks to benefit from her misery. In a review published on August 16, 2003 in the Uruguayan daily El país, Elbio Barilari (who later became the co-artistic director of the Chicago Latino Music Festival) praises the work of directors Patricia Pisani and Graciela Balletti and the choreography they created around Rodolfo Mederos’ music. 

And now, as Monty Python would say, for something completely different. The ILCC joined forces with the Mikey O Comedy Show, a pioneer programmer of Latino stand-up shows in Chicago, to launch in 2004 a series titled CHISTES with three nights of comedy at Joe’s Bar on Weed Street in the Lincoln Park neighborhood. The first show held on October 29 featured Chicago’s Patti Vazquez telling stories about growing up in an Irish-Mexican-American family, working in unsatisfying jobs and humiliating moments at the doctor’s office. Audiences were invited to dress in full costume (the event took place days before Halloween and Día de los Muertos) to win tickets for the following year’s Chicago Latino Film Festival. 

Then, on November 12, L.A. comedian Noe González headlined a night of comedy featuring several local comedians and on January 21, 2005, Vasquez returned to Joe’s on Weed for an encore performance featuring comedians Alex Ortiz, Ricky Carmona and Joey Villagomez. A year later, on September 30, 2025, the series moved to Chromium Night Club on Fulton Market with headliners Luke Torres (In Living Color), Sara Contreras (The View, Third Watch) and Eric Nieves, described by the promotional materials as the most sought-after Latino comic in New York at the time.

On January 19, 2006 the series went back to Joe’s with performances by Vasquez, Ortiz, Vince Acevedo, Ricky Carmona, Villagomez and Chon.

Unfortunately, there are no records in our archives of any theatrical or stand-up events. That doesn’t mean that there weren’t any produced or presented in the last ten years. It just means that, like most not-for-profit organizations, especially arts organizations, the ILCC did not have the foresight to preserve for posterity many of the materials (photos, brochures, press clippings) for most of the events produced during these past 25 years.

In 2016, the ILCC announced that it was joining forces with the National Museum of Mexican Art and the Puerto Rican Arts Alliance, and arts executive Myrna Salazar (who from 2007-2011 was the Center’s Director of Development and Marketing) to create the Chicago Latino Theater Alliance (CLATA). The Alliance’s mission is to support the development of emerging and established Latino playwrights, actors, directors and theater professionals and cultivate a vibrant and inclusive theater community. CLATA’s signature event Destinos: The Chicago International Latino Theater Festival, brings together dozens of theater companies and artists from Chicago and all over Latin America in venues across the city.

Working for the first time with Center on Halsted, a gay, lesbian, transgender and community center located in the heart of what is known as Boystown in Lakeview, The International Latino Cultural Center presented from July 20-22, 2023, the Chicago premiere of Venezuelan actor and transdisciplinary artist Migguel Anggelo’s theatrical experience, LatinXoxo, in the Center’s main stage. The 70-minute long show combines original and reinterpreted music with dance and theater, and explores the connections of Anggelo’s Latino immigrant identity to his search for freedom.

Three years ago as well, the Center started co-presenting and promoting some of the Latin American plays and companies Physical Theater Festival Chicago programmed as part of its annual event. Launched in 2014 by Alice da Cunha and Marc Frost through the Artistic Associate program at Links Hall, Physical Theater Festival Chicago presents new forms of theater that are being performed around the world.  

Marrano: a Tale from the Inquisition, a riveting tale about intolerance and religious persecution presented as part of the 10th Annual Physical Theater Festival Chicago at Theater Wit, July 13-15, 2023, marked the beginning of this collaboration. Produced and staged by the Spanish-Israeli company LaPercha Teatro, Marrano: a tale from the Inquisition focuses on the assassination in Zaragoza, Spain, of Pedro de Arbúes, the highest representative of the Holy Inquisition in 1485. Five actors played more than twenty characters; in order to recreate the Jewish culture of that time, ancient Sephardic melodies and Hebrew prayers were sung and performed. 

The following year, again at Theatre Wit, both presented Macacos from July 18-20, 2024. Written, directed and performed by Clayton Nascimento, the actor uses nothing more than his own body, voice and a lipstick, to bring the story of Brazil and slavery to the stage, from rulings by the Portuguese Court during slavery to the present day, when executions of black people by the police go unpunished.

And this year, they co-presented one of The Guardian’s top 10 best theatre shows of 2024: REWIND by Epheremal Ensemble from June 5-7 at Theatre Wit. The play invites audiences to witness the investigation of a crime secretly buried through powerful live music, energetic physical theatre and striking visual imagery.  Ephemeral Ensemble drew from real testimonies of Latin American refugees and migrants across generations, weaving their stories with the groundbreaking science of Forensic Anthropology—the first discipline in history dedicated to investigating human rights violations.

For now, the lights have temporarily gone dark for the ILCC when it comes to any future theatrical presentations. Here’s how you can help the ILCC keep that curtain raised:

As part of its fundraising campaign commemorating its 25th anniversary, the International Latino Cultural Center will be hosting a dinner celebration at CineCity Studios, 2429 West 14th St. on Friday, November 14, featuring a solo performance from Grammy® and Latin Grammy® Award winning artist Alex Cuba and the very best in Latino cuisine. Doors open at 6 p.m. For more information, visit the ILCC’s official fundraising dinner page. 

Unable to make the event? Never fear, you can still be part of our campaign with your individual contribution. Every single bit helps our mission to preserve in the city of Chicago a space for Pan-Latino arts in all its glorious disciplines. For more information on individual giving visit our individual giving page.

The International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago is a 501(3)(c) nonprofit cultural organization. All contributions are tax-deductible to the full extent allowed by the law.

With the hiring in January, 2022 of Mateo Mulcahy, former Director of Community Projects and Events at the Old Town School of Folk Music, as the ILCC’s Deputy Executive Director and music and dance curator, the Chicago Latino Music began to take shape.

He walked through the ILCC’s doors with guns a-blazing. Not only did he add the ILCC as a co-presenter to the many World Music Wednesdays concerts he had already scheduled at the Old Town School of Folk Music for the year before his departure. Under his leadership, the ILCC presented and co-presented concerts featuring such high profile artists as Alex Cuba (the musical guest of the ILCC’s fundraising dinner on November 14), Los Van Van, Chilean singer-songwriter Pascuala Ilabaca, and São Paulo musician and educator Paulo Padilha. 

The 2022 Chicago latino Music Series wrapped up the year with an equally eclectic lineup which included: a Zapotec folk dance troupe (Galguez Laxá) and a Zapotec rock group (Dizá) as part of the city of Chicago’s Indigenous Peoples Day celebrations; explores the influences of Middle Eastern music on Andalusia, Spain (The Andalusian Trail and flamenco guitarist Juan Carmona); presented 16-year-old guitar prodigy Juan Ausiàs Parejo from Valencia; and celebrated the tradition of las tunas (that dates back to 13th century Spain and Portugal when students went about singing and playing music out of the pure need to survive and pay their school fees) with La Tuna de Oro de Guanajuato. 

The following year, produced 33 music concerts in 18 venues, featuring some big names including: Olga Cerpa, one of the most important female voices in the Canary Islands, and her group Mestisay at the Segundo Ruiz Belvis Cultural Center in the West side neighborhood of Hermosa; Juan de Marco González and his Afro-Cuban All Stars at Dominican University’s Lund Auditorium in the suburb of River Forest; Argentinian rocker Kevin Johansen and graphic designer and illustrator Liniers collaborating on a multimedia show at the Old Town School of Folk Music, the Afro-Peruvian folk-electronica group Novalima as part of that year’s Indigenous Peoples Day celebration at Chop Shop, a music venue/restaurant/butcher shop located in the Wicker Park neighborhood; and son jarocho legends Mono Blanco at Instituto Cervantes. 

When it comes to big names, however, the ILCC took a big gamble by joining forces with national events producer Backstage Productions to present the Chicago debut of samba superstar Zeca Pagondinho on June 14 at The Vic Theater. Born Jessé Gomes da Silva Filho in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro, Zeca started his career as a child in the 1970s and became a regular performer in samba gatherings, where he perfected a samba style known as Pagode. This new style triggered a samba revival in the 1980s, when Zeca became known as its true face. It was in the most important of these pagodes, the one that gathered the bloco carnavalesco Cacique de Ramos, that he became acquainted with another samba legend, Beth Carvalho, who became his madrinha, or protector. Does that name ring a bell? 

Last year, the ILCC launched the inaugural season of the Levitt VIBE Belmont Cragin Music Series at Riis Park, in the far northwest mostly Latino community of Belmont Cragin. Supported in part by the Mortimer & Mimi Levitt Foundation, which partners with changemakers and nonprofits across the country to activate underused outdoor spaces through the power of free, live music, the series featured a mix of local, national, and international artists (some making their Chicago debut) from across the Latino diaspora for 10 consecutive weeks from mid-June to mid-August,. Artists included: the cumbia-punk-queer group Kumbia Queers; Montreal-based Haitian musician Wesli; singer-songwriter Sara Curruchich, the first indigenous Guatemalan singer and songwriter to sing in Kaqchikel; and Chicago’s ESSO Afrojam Funkbeat.

Speaking of Chicago debuts, the ILCC joined forces with the Instituto Cervantes to bring two of the most exciting, innovative flamenco women performers as part of Cervantes’ annual Flamenco Festival in March of last year: María José Llergo and Las Migas. Llergo had already been the subject of a New York Times article that helped elevate her profile in the United States while Las Migas were celebrating their 20th anniversary with a new lineup and a Latin Grammy award in 2022 for their album Libres in their pockets. Las Migas would return to Chicago for an encore performance on November 15 at the Old Town School of Folk Music to present their brand new album Rumberas, a tribute to rumba in all its forms.

Another highlight of what turned out to be a hectic 2024 series was a program of two concerts the ILCC titled The Galicia/Portugal Connection, an exploration, through music, of the cultural ties that bind Portugal with Galicia, in the Northwest region of Spain. The series featured the return to Chicago, after ten years, of acclaimed Galician bagpipe player Carlos Núñez. Considered the “7th member of The Chieftains” and proclaimed the “Jimi Hendrix of bagpipes” by Billboard. The concert, produced in partnership with the Irish American Heritage Center and with community partner Instituto Cervantes, was held at the Irish American Heritage Center on October 15.

Then, on November 2, fado sensation Carminho kicked off her US tour at City Winery, to support the release of the EP Carminho at Electrical Audio, which was co-produced and engineered by the late Steve Albini in his Chicago studio, Electrical Audio. Albini is known for his work with some of the finest musicians including Nirvana, Page & Plant, and The Pixies, among others. The EP includes a duet with the iconic Brazilian artist Caetano Veloso.

Lessons learned from last year’s Levitt VIBE Belmont Cragin Music Series were applied this year to the Levitt VIBE Chicago Music Series. Instead of mid-afternoon, most concerts would start after 6 pm, guaranteeing a larger audience. Through social media, the ILCC reached out to neighborhood organizations and businesses to get out of the word. The concerts were still held on Saturdays from mid-June to mid-August but instead of taking place in one park, the series expanded to four: Riis Park and, on the south and southwest side, La Villita Park, Gage Park and Rainbow Beach. For the first time in its history, the ILCC featured Regional Mexican Music as part of its programming through this summer series with performances from local stalwarts La Ley del Norte, Banda el Recuerdo and Grupo Love Secreto. This year’s series also featured the Chicago debut of Las Karamba, an all-female ensemble based in Barcelona that brings together six musicians from Venezuela, Cuba, Catalonia, France, and Argentina who infuse traditional styles like Son, Cha-Cha-Cha, Salsa, and Timba with rap and urban influences. 

Outside of the Levitt series, the ILCC was far more judicious and strategic when it came to the number of concerts produced this year, especially given this current administration’s attack on the arts Besides after-Levitt shows for Los Crema Paraíso and Dos Santos at Fitzgerald, a second show of Las Karamba at the Segundo Ruiz Belvis Cultural Center and multiple appearances by Los Gaiteros de Pueblo Santo at outdoor events and indoor venues during the summer, the ILCC also presented two kickass jazz shows at Constellation: Paquito D’Rivera, Fareed Haque and multi-instrumentalist Howard Levy on May 14, followed on June 6 by Puerto Rican trumpetist Charlie Sepúlveda and his band The Turnaround with Eligio “Prodigio” Claudio in the Puerto Rican cuatro.

What will the Chicago Latino Music Series look like in 2026 and beyond? Well, that’s where you, our dear reader and supporter, come in:

As part of its fundraising campaign commemorating its 25th anniversary, the International Latino Cultural Center will be hosting a dinner celebration at CineCity Studios, 2429 West 14th St. on Friday, November 14, featuring a solo performance from Grammy® and Latin Grammy® Award winning artist Alex Cuba and the very best in Latino cuisine. Doors open at 6 p.m. For more information, visit the ILCC’s official fundraising dinner page. 

Unable to make the event? Never fear, you can still be part of our campaign with your individual contribution. Every single bit helps our mission to preserve in the city of Chicago a space for Pan-Latino arts in all its glorious disciplines. For more information on individual giving visit our individual giving page.

The International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago is a 501(3)(c) nonprofit cultural organization. All contributions are tax-deductible to the full extent allowed by the law.

The International Latino Cultural Center’s programming is built around seven programming pillars: film, music, dance, theater, the culinary arts, the visual arts and literature. Of these seven pillars, music, without a doubt, is the ILCC’s second largest program after film.

And for good reason. As the late Dick Clark said, “music is the soundtrack of our lives.” Walk down any street of Latin America or Spain or even the Latino barrios of the United States, step into any Latino restaurant or business or household and you will be surrounded by the sounds of any of the dozens of rhythms from the Latino diaspora coming from radios, stereo systems or any other device. According to Nielsen, Latino “consumers spend 32 hours a week listening to music, outpacing non-Hispanic Whites and the total U.S. population. Radio—both online and terrestrial—remains a key source of music for Latinx, who consume far more radio than the total U.S. population.”

THE ILCC MAKES A GRAND MUSICAL ENTRANCE

Based on the materials available on the ILCC archives, music programming at the turn of the century and for the next 20 years consisted of two strands: individual concerts that truly reflected the sheer diversity of Pan-Latino musical expressions and, from 2006 until 2019, programming focused exclusively on classical, experimental and instrumental music from Iberoamerica and the United States through an annual three-month long Festival in the fall.

The first concert of the new decade, century and millennium of which the the newly rebranded ILCC has any record of on its archives featured the one and only, the queen of the EGOTs (term used to refer to those artists who have won the Emmy, the Grammy, the Oscar and the Tony) Rita Moreno. And if that was, indeed, truly the first concert of the 2000s for the ILCC, what a way to kick off the newly rebranded organization!

Held on March 8, 2001 at the now shuttered Black Orchid Classic Nightclub on the Pipers Alley Complex in Chicago’s Old Town neighborhood, An Evening with Rita Moreno, was a cabaret-style performance featuring a range of Broadway tunes, jazz, blues, Latin music and even swing, with a couple of stories and anecdotes thrown in for good measure. 

The ILCC presented Rita that evening with the Gloria Lifetime Achievement Award for her outstanding artistic contributions and humanitarian contributions to society. Then 26th Ward Alderman Billy Ocasio also presented her with an official proclamation declaring March 8 as Rita Moreno Day. Proceeds of the event, which included cocktails and a buffet dinner, were used to fund the ILCC’s operations and events. 

The ILCC ramped up its music programming that fall, beginning with Ellas y su rumba: The Women of Latin Music on September 13, 2001 at Three Arts Club in the Gold Coast neighborhood, a residence built in 1914 for young women studying music, drama and the visual arts. The music and dance program featured several local women artists including dance instructor Lisa “La Boriqua” from Latin Street Dancing, Ensemble Español founder Libby Komaiko, and singer Clara Beatriz Jaramillo, among others. Today, this historic venue is part of a redesigned 70,000 square foot design gallery blurring, according to its website, “the lines between residential and retail, indoors and outdoors, home and hospitality.”

The Three Arts Club would also be the host for a special performance by Spanish classical pianist Sylvia Torán with reception and silent auction on October 5, 2001, the third of three performances she offered throughout the city, including one on October 1 at Columbia College’s Music Center and on the 3rd at Northeastern Illinois University’s Recital Hall.

Tango reared its head again two weeks later, on October 14, with a performance (originally scheduled for April 21) from Opus Cuatro, the highly acclaimed Argentinian a cappella group featuring a special guest appearance by Chicago dance studio Tango 21 at the University of Illinois-Chicago’s Inner Circle Auditorium. Then, in partnership with the Chicago Humanities Festival, the ILCC presented a program of Ecuadorian dance and music on November 10, 2001 at Vittum Theater in West Town. The program included a performance by Ecuadorian dancer Wilson Pico of The Materials of Rage and Love, a series of solo dances, and musical group Tribus Futuras performing selections from their album Children of the Wind.

However, the true highlight of this fall season was the Chicago debut of acclaimed Cuban pianist Ernán López-Nussa at the Getz Theater on September 26. A founding member of the jazz fusion group Afrocuba and himself the head of a music dynasty (not unlike the Valdés and Rubalcaba dynasties) that includes pianist Harold López-Nussa and drummer Ruy Adrián López-Nussa (nephews), Ernán performed tracks from his landmark album From Havana to Rio while revisiting the history of Cuban piano music.

And that was only 2001!

Additional musicians presented by the ILCC in the following five years include: David Puerta, master of the Colombian tiple, a twelve-string instrument, three-fourths the size of a classical guitar at Vittum Theater on July 18, 2002 as part of Chicago’s Colombian Independence Day celebrations; Peruvian guitarist and charango player Julio Humala at Loyola University’s Sullivan Center on July 26, 2002; a special Christmas concert featuring Latin jazz and salsa pianist Samuel del Real on December 11, 2002 at the Hothouse; and a taste of things to come: A Musical Journey Through Latin America Art Songs, a selection of classical vocal music interpreted by Colombian soprano Patricia Caicedo and pianist Eugenia Gassull on piano at Columbia College’s Concert Hall on October 5, 2005.

A rare Chicago performance by Brazil’s “Godmother of samba” Beth Carvalho at the Logan Square Auditorium on June 23, 2005 was another significant highlight of the ILCC’s musical programming in these first five years of the new decade, century and millennium. Recognized with a Latin Recording Academy® Lifetime Achievement Award at the 13th Annual Latin GRAMMY Awards® and a Latin GRAMMY® for Best Samba/Pagode Album for Nosso Samba Tá Na Rua, Carvalho helped bring underrated composers the recognition they deserved, becoming a driving force in the modernization of samba in the ’80s, while preserving its roots. She passed away in 2019.

A SHIFT IN MUSICAL GEARS

In 2006, the ILCC’s music programming shifted gears: for the following 13 years, it would be dominated by classical, instrumental and avant-garde concerts from Latin America, Spain and Latino musicians living in Chicago. It started with two concerts at St. James Cathedral and Columbia College on October 21 and 27, 2006 under the banner First Latino Symphonic Festival of Chicago. Positioned as “a premier concert series of Latino composers by Latino soloists designed to pay homage to Latin American and Spanish composers in the field of classical music,” the festival featured the world premiere of Gustavo Leone’s Cantico del Popol Vuh performed by the Latino Chamber Orchestra and DePaul University’s Chorus and a performance by the Latino Chamber Musicians of music by Joaquín Turina, Alberto Ginastera and Manuel de Falla, among others.

The following year, under the artistic direction of composers and musicians Elbio Barilari and Gustavo Leone, the Festival changed its name to the Latino Music Festival, and pretty quickly became Chicago’s only Latin American music festival dedicated in its entirety to Latin American, Spanish and Portuguese classical, instrumental and experimental music in all its forms, from solo performances to string quartets to orchestral arrangements.

That first festival under Barilari’s and Leone’s direction presented seven free concerts and one public forum on Latin American music with Grammy® Award winning classical composer Osvaldo Golijov (then a composer-in-residence at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra), from October 28-December 16, 2007. Locations included Lake Forest College, Chicago Cultural Center’s Preston Bradley Hall, Merit School of Music, Orchestra Hall (now Symphony Center), and Columbia College.

The following year, the Festival featured 16 concerts of Latin American and Spanish Music from the Baroque to the 21st Century over three and a half months in such venues as the Harris Theatre for Dance and Music, Ravinia Festival, Symphony Center, Chicago Cultural Center, DePaul University, Merit School of Music, The International House, St. Luke’s Lutheran Church and Lyon & Healy Concert Hall. The number of concerts went up to 20 in 2009 and so did the number of venues which now included the Art Institute of Chicago, SPACE in Evanston and the University of Wisconsin-Parkside in Kenosha.

By 2012, the number of concerts had increased to 27. For the following seven years, the number of concerts would average between 20-24 per year.

Festival highlights include: Fareed Haque’s “Hymn of the Ancients,” an exploration of classical Indian music at the Humboldt Park Boathouse; a concert by the legendary Paquito D’Rivera celebrating the second anniversary of WFMT 98.8’s nationally syndicated radio program “Fiesta!”, hosted by Barilari; a special performance of Quilapayún’s “Cantata Santa María de Iquique” by Chicago’s very own Sones de Mexico Ensemble about the struggle of the workers on the salt fields of northern Chile in the early part of the 20^th Century; and the Chicago debut of the Recycled Instruments Orchestra of Cateura, an orchestra comprised of boys, girls, teenagers and young adults with limited access to resources, who live in the Bañado Sur community, located next to the Cateura landfill, in Asuncion, Paraguay who perform musical pieces using instruments elaborated with garbage reclaimed from the landfill.

Then came COVID-19. The pandemic gave ILCC executive director Pepe Vargas the opportunity to reinvent the Festival as a year-round music series that would present a wide overview of the many musical styles representing the Latino diaspora worldwide. The ILCC formally launched the series in 2021 with seven virtual concerts featuring Spanish pianist/composer Carlos Bianchini’s audiovisual avant-garde spectacle Yo, Piano; a centennial celebration of the works of Argentinian composer Astor Piazzolla by the KFune Duo (Sept. 29); and a musical tribute to Spanish poet Federico García Lorca by Colombian soprano Wilma Rueda and German guitarist Christian Reichert. The concerts were made available virtually to residents of Illinois and the Midwest states of Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan and Indiana.

End of Part One.

As part of its fundraising campaign commemorating its 25th anniversary, the International Latino Cultural Center will be hosting a dinner celebration at CineCity Studios, 2429 West 14th St. on Friday, November 14, featuring a solo performance from Grammy® and Latin Grammy® Award winning artist Alex Cuba and the very best in Latino cuisine. Doors open at 6 p.m. For more information, visit the ILCC’s official fundraising dinner page. 

Unable to make the event? Never fear, you can still be part of our campaign with your individual contribution. Every single bit helps our mission to preserve in the city of Chicago a space for Pan-Latino arts in all its glorious disciplines. For more information on individual giving visit our individual giving page.

The International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago is a 501(3)(c) nonprofit cultural organization. All contributions are tax-deductible to the full extent allowed by the law.

The full history of the International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago (ILCC) cannot be fully told without a trip through time and space to those very first non-film events. We may not have a time machine, but we do have a rather modest archive full of programs, ads, photos and all sorts of collateral material. Items may be missing from that archive; it would take a full time historian to dig through old microfilms and microfiches to help us fill in the blanks. Still, what we found in those archives reveals an organization that was beginning to test the boundaries of what a fully multi-disciplinary Pan-Latino arts organization would look like.

A concert titled The Voice of Tish Hinojosa held at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Oak Brook on February 1, 1995 was the first evidence of a pre-ILCC non-film event we could find in our archives. Co-presented with the Illinois Resource Center and Illinois Association for Multicultural Education, Tish Hinojosa was at the time one of the supreme voices of the Austin music scene in particular and American folk music in general. Although she hasn’t performed much in the Chicagoland area these past couple of years, Hinojosa is still in high demand, especially in Europe. Last year, she released her highly autobiographical 17th album, With a Guitar & a Pen, described by Pop Matters as “optimistic,” “happy, even joyous.”

The following year, Chicago Latino Cinema in collaboration with Columbia College and the Consulate General of Chile presented, in Spanish with English translation, the Chilean play La Negra Ester, based on the poem Las décimas de la negra Ester by Roberto Parra and and performed by the Chilean theater group Gran Circo Teatro. Staged from October 2-5, 1996 at Columbia College’s Getz Theater, home for many of the theatrical productions and concerts the ILCC would present and co-present for close to two decades, and originally staged prior to the 1989 general elections that led to the end of military rule in Chile, La Negra Ester tells the story of Roberto Parra’s, brother of Violeta and Nicanor Parra, love affair with a beautiful prostitute, La Negra Ester. On an article about the L.A. stop of the play during its first U.S. tour, the Los Angeles Times highlighted the actors’ clownish makeup and “experiments with many universal folk-theater techniques, including mime and commedia dell’arte. International critics have also cited such influences as Charlie Chaplin and Groucho Marx.” Gran Circo Teatro is still active in Chile under the leadership of Rosa Ramírez, widow of company founder Andrés Pérez.

Two years later, Chicago Latino Cinema joined forces with Columbia College Chicago, The Consulate General of Mexico and The Mexican Cultural and Educational Institute to celebrate the centennial of Mexican cinema with the series Mexican Cinema: Reflections of a Nation. A series of seven films, including Emilio “El Indio” Fernández’s Salón México (1948), Felipe Cazals’ Canoa (1975) and Jaime Humberto Hermosillo’s María de mi corazón (1979) co-written by Gabriel García Márquez, were screened at Facets Multimedia (today Facets Film Forum), from November 6-12, 1998. It was one of many film retrospectives the organization would produce outside their annual film festival.

Another centennial was celebrated the following month: the birth of Spanish poet Federico García Lorca. A special presentation of his classic play Yerma staged by New York’s Repertorio Español made its Chicago premiere on December 4 and 5, 1998 at The Getz Theater. In its review of this production directed by René Buch with music by Marshall Coid, ¡Exito!, the Chicago Tribune’s Spanish-language weekly, highlighted the play’s Pan-Latino cast and the use of Gregorian chants and avant-garde music to highlight the play’s highly charged eroticism and tragedy.

Colombia’s Estudiantina Boyacá made its Chicago debut on May 8, 1999 at Loyola University’s Sullivan Center thanks to a collaboration with Columbia College Chicago, the Consulate General of Colombia and the American Colombian Foundation. Founded in 1979 by Samuel Malagón Bravo in the central Colombian department of Boyacá, bordering Venezuela to the northeast, the Estudiantina uses a chamber instrumental format as its foundation for its repertoire of traditional music. The Estudiantina Boyacá is currently made up of a roster of ten emerging talents who bring the full force of their youth to the music they began to recognize, admire, and value from a very young age. 

Chicago Latino Cinema, and later the ILCC, placed a huge bet on tango after the international success of such spectacles as Luis Bravo’s Forever Tango. One of the organization’s early tango programs was the multidisciplinary event Paris in Chicago…and Tango held at multiple locations between July 7 and 16, 1999. The event featured a photo exhibition documenting the life and history of Paris from 1880 to 1968 at what was then known as the James R. Thompson Center and is today being turned into Google’s Chicago headquarters. Paris in Chicago…and Tango also featured a special screening of Fernando Solana’s set-in-Paris 1985 film, Tangos, the Exile of Gardel at the Water Tower Theatre complex (July 14) and ended with Tango: The Songs, Music and Dance featuring the cast of Solo Tango at the Getz Theater (July 15).

This was followed by Naturalmente Tango, presented from December 2-5, 1999 also at the Getz Theater. Advertised as “the history of tango shown through music, song and dance in one spectacular performance of theatrical beauty” by the Uruguayan group Tango Tan, the event is notable because, on its program book, Chicago Latino Cinema Founder and Executive Director Pepe Vargas formally announced the organization was changing its name to the International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago.

“The name change is a move to more adequately depict our mission of developing, promoting and increasing awareness of the multinational Latino cultures among Latinos and other communities through art and education; and is just one of the many transitions we are undergoing in order to better serve our community and the public at large,” wrote Vargas. In that message, Vargas also announced the organization’s plans to build a multi-arts complex that would showcase the myriad artistic disciplines practiced by Latinos around the world.

And so, as the new millennium approached, the newly renamed organization looked towards a future full of possibilities and new challenges.

As part of its fundraising campaign commemorating its 25th anniversary, the International Latino Cultural Center will be hosting a dinner celebration at CineCity Studios, 2429 West 14th St. on Friday, November 14, featuring a solo performance from Grammy® and Latin Grammy® Award winning artist Alex Cuba and the very best in Latino cuisine. Doors open at 6 p.m. For more information, visit the ILCC’s official fundraising dinner page. 

Unable to make the event? Never fear, you can still be part of our campaign with your individual contribution. Every single bit helps our mission to preserve in the city of Chicago a space for Pan-Latino arts in all its glorious disciplines. For more information on individual giving visit our individual giving page.

The International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago is a 501(3)(c) nonprofit cultural organization. All contributions are tax-deductible to the full extent allowed by the law.

This was more than a cosmetic change. The decision strengthened Founder and Executive Director Pepe Vargas and his team’s commitment in presenting in Chicago the most daring, exciting, moving and unique artists and productions from the entire Pan-Latino diaspora, including Latin America, the Caribbean, Spain and Portugal, and the many Latino communities in the United States. Of sharing with Chicago audiences from all walks of life the diversity of Pan-Latino voices while celebrating those commonalities that unite these countries and communities.

Since then, the ILCC has presented hundreds of musicians, dancers, writers, filmmakers and painters, most of them making their Chicago, some even their North American, debut. The ILCC has taken the show on the road, so to say, bringing these artists to culturally underserved communities all across Chicago, from Belmont-Cragin to Pilsen. More than 25% of the programming is free, including matinee screenings for school groups during the film festival, concerts and films in parks, and an annual dance festival.

But today that vision, and the vision of many other arts organizations in the city and the country, is under attack. The ILCC has seen a significant reduction in federal funding, impacting their ability to present and produce culturally relevant programming that speaks to the whole city.

PARTY WITH A CAUSE

To shine a spotlight on their ongoing successful work and to raise the funds needed to maintain and build crucial and indispensable programming for the community and the public at large, the ILCC is launching a fundraising campaign under the slogan Honoring Our History, Investing in Our Future. 

The campaign’s headline event will be the 25th anniversary dinner celebration at CineCity Studios, 2429 West 14th St. on Friday, November 14, that will include pre-reception cocktails, the very best in Latino cuisine, and an unforgettable solo performance by Grammy® and Latin Grammy® Award winning artist Alex Cuba. 

Born Alexis Puentes in Artemisa, Cuba, Alex Cuba studied electric and upright bass at a young age. In 1999, he moved to Victoria, British Columbia, where he recorded an album, Morumba Cubana, with his twin brother, Adonis. Alex went on to record his solo debut album, Humo De Tobaco, for which he earned a Juno Award for World Music Album of the Year for 2006. In 2009, he released his first-ever English track, “If You Give Me Love.” In 2010, he took home the award for Best New Artist at the Latin Grammy Awards, where he also got a nomination for Best Male Pop Vocal Album. A second Latin Grammy soon followed, this time as a songwriter, alongside Yoel Henriquez, for Best Tropical Song for Milly Quezada’s single, “Toma Mi Vida,” featuring Juan Luis Guerra 

In 2017, Alex Cuba continued to push the boundaries of his music. His sixth album, Lo Único Constante, delved deeper into his songwriting roots, focusing on a nylon string guitar and upright bass and looking at the “Filin” movement in Cuba in the 1940s that fused jazz and trova, 19th-century Cuban folk music, together. On May 28, Alex Cuba released a brand new single, Nada es de Verdad, with Grammy-Award winning Miami-based pan-Latino sensation Bacilos. 

MORE THAN ONE WAY TO HELP

Individual contributions are a key component of the ILCC’s fundraising campaign. For a contribution as low as $20 a month, supporters will contribute to the lasting stability of the organization and ensure that Latin arts will still have a voice and a space in the city. 

For more information on the ILCC’s 25th anniversary fundraising dinner and individual contributions, visit the ILCC’s official fundraising page. 

“As an organization, we do not have a tradition of an annual fundraiser as most nonprofits do, yet perilous times impel us to take a moment to both celebrate our milestone and to provide others an opportunity to invest in the future of Latino arts in Chicago. We want to continue sharing those transformative stories with Chicago audiences for years to come,” said Pepe Vargas, Founder and Executive Director of the ILCC

“Our silver jubilee is more than a celebration. It also represents an opportunity to renew our deep commitment to presenting multidisciplinary work from across the Pan-Latino diaspora. These are, undoubtedly, challenging times for the arts and for arts organizations like ours. Our fundraising campaign and gala will help pave the way for a more sustainable future for our organization,” added Mateo Mulcahy, Deputy Executive Director of the ILCC.

The International Latino Cultural Center of Chicago is a 501(3)(c) nonprofit cultural organization. All contributions are tax-deductible to the full extent allowed by the law.