The Africans In Latin America: Celia Cruz

This week I decided to do an art series using different mediums showing Africans in Latin America. First, piece I did was in watercolor of Celia Cruz titled A Night of Salsa With Celia. It was copied from an image of her singing in South Africa in the 1970s with the Fania All Stars; a Latino music group consisting of band members playing instruments from the trumpet to bongos that formed in New York City in 1964. She was an Afro Cuban woman who had energy when performing captivating crowds all over. I grew up watching her perform and did not know she was Cuban until I became a teenager. As others growing up in North America, I had the perception of Latinos to be from what was seen through the media fair skinned with dark hair looking almost white or brown skin looking Indian never black or Asian. Then, I learned as everyone else that countries in Latin America had a mixture of races and its history is like North America due to colonization. The Spaniard's came to the other America known as South America and brought over Africans as slaves when the Native American population were not well enough to perform labor dying from diseases brought by colonizers on the islands. The music, culture and language is a blend of African, European and Asian. When seeing the people they clearly represent its mixture of culture. Artist like Cruz in their music shows it. Our language is different we learn their message including hers of what she was saying. Cruz's music is stilled played in Latin communities and when listening to old Latin music salsa or bachata with instruments such as the trumpet, the piano, guitar and the Congo drums, the sound of Africa is heard. She is seen to represent it. The woman known as the queen of salsa but little did we know here in the United States that she experienced prejudice on stage in Spanish speaking countries due to the color of her skin but shown the people she can be as brilliant which lead her to become known in every household globally. The first time I seen her was in preschool on an episode of Sesame Street singing amongst puppets. During that time, she took part in a children's educational television show educating children about Latin American culture and that there were people that looked like her. Cruz leaves behind something that has changed lives and the pieces tells her story doing it.

A Night of Salsa With Celia. Watercolor.

Celia Telling Big Bird A Story About A Bird That Went Zun Zun. Mixed media. Portrait of her on an episode of Sesame Street.