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Music, recipes, poetry, art, cinema, theater and history make up the rich cornucopia of Latino culture showcased on www.Latinopia.com a new website set for launch March 19, 2011.
The brainchild of veteran Los Angeles television director and documentary filmmaker Jesús Salvador Treviño, the video-driven website is designed as a one-stop web destination for all things Latino.
“As U.S. Latinos enter the digital age, we need a website that can offer videos about all aspects of our history culture and life,” explains Jesús Treviño, whose television credits include programs like Law and Order-Criminal Intent, The Unit, Criminal Minds and Resurrection Blvd and who shot and edited much of the video footage on Latinopia.com.
“We’re starting with five-minute videos in seven subject areas--interviews, music performances, short films, theater plays and authors reading from their works,” Trevino explains. “We are excited that top Latino writers, artists and musicians from around the U.S. have seen the value of Latinopia.com and are enthusiastically sharing their time, stories and creativity.
A click on Latinopia’s Art section will take the visitor to video profiles of Chicano, Puerto Rican and Cuban American artists, painters and muralists such as Gilbert “Magu” Lujan, Ester Hernández, Frank Romero, Yolanda López, César Martínez, Rupert García, José Montoya, Gronk, Judy Baca, Carmen Lomas Garza, Zarco Guerrero as well as print interviews and special features.
The Literature section features a timeline on the emergence of Chicano, Puerto Rican and Cuban-American literature in the United States in addition to listings of Latino books. Video interviews include such important Latino writers such as Rudolfo Anaya, Pat Mora, Dagoberto Gilb, Judith Ortíz Cofer, Alberto Rios, Denise Chavez and Luis J. Rodríguez. Dramatic re-enactments and additional footage bring their works to life.
The website’s Theater section includes video interviews with Chicano, Puerto Rican and Cuban American playwrights, actors and stage directors and groups like Culture Clash as well as excerpts from plays written performed and directed by Latinos in New York, Los Angeles, San Antonio, Chicago, Miami, Los Angeles and San Francisco; among them Crystal City 1969, Gaytino, Regeneración, and The Silver Dollar.
Interviews with leading Chicano, Puerto Rican and Cuban musicians are an attraction in the Music section: Los Lobos, Little Joe and La Familia, Flaco Jimenez all discuss their art. There are also performances by such groups as Mitote, Los Pochos, La Santa Cecilia, Olmeca.
In Cinema and Television many of the nation’s leading Latino actresses and actors discuss their work and making their way in Hollywood: Hector Elizondo, Lupe Ontiveros, Jimmy Smits, Edward James Olmos, America Ferrera, Evelina Fernandez and are among those to be featured. Behind the camera talent will also be featured such as writer/producer Dennis Leoni (Resurrection Blvd), Director of Photography Rey Villalobos (Nine to Five, Urban Cowboy) and Director Leon Ichaso (El Cantante).
A visit to the History page will reveal videos of important historical events in Chicano and Latino life along with event timelines, biographies and documents. It includes profiles of important Chicano, Puerto Rican and Cuban American leaders and historical figures such as Jose Marti, Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta.
Latinopia Food offers Latinopia’s recommendations on the best places in major cities in the United States to eat Mexican and Latino food along with “how-to” videos on making great Mexican food--enchiladas, guacamole, Spanish rice, salsa-- as well as Puerto Rican and Cuban American cuisine.
“We are launching modestly with a few dozen videos,“ Jesús Treviño explains, “but we add new videos each week and will grow the site into more than hundred videos by the end of the first year. Seeing is believing. Check us out at www.Latinopia.com ”
“Once we establish an audience of regular visitors, we plan to expand beyond short videos into original webisodes and longer form dramas geared to the Latino public. The potential is as rich and limitless as is the life and culture of America’s 47 million Latinos.”
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