| Paul S. Flores is a published poet, novelist and one of the nation’s prominent spoken word performers. Raised on the Tijuana / San Diego border, issues of immigration, border experience and Latino identity are central to his work. A versatile artist and a key collaborator in many ground-breaking theater projects, Flores’ playwriting and stage performance credits include Fear of a Brown Planet and No Man’s Land. He is also the author of the novel Along the Border Lies which was awarded the PEN Oakland / Josephine Miles National Literary Award in 2003. He has performed at the National Hip-Hop Festival in Havana, Cuba and was featured on Season 4 of Russell Simmons Presents: Def Poetry Jam on HBO.
For this year’s San Francisco Arts Festival, Flores will join with Julio Cardenas for a new performance experience: REPRESENTA! – bilingual theatre for the hip-hop generation. Commissioned by the San Francisco International Arts Festival and La Peña Cultural Center, REPRESENTA!, directed by Danny Hoch, is a fiercely incisive commentary on terrorism, immigration, Cuba, U.S. foreign policy, Bay Area lefty culture, New York after 9/11 and pan-Latino identity. Setting itself apart from other spoken-word performance, REPRESENTA! is bilingual theatre which combines spoken-word poetry with character portrayals that are simultaneously hilariously entertaining and provocative. All performances are presented with super-title translation.
“I wrote REPRESENTA! to illuminate the contemporary Latino experience and its relationship to hip-hop,” says Flores. “Hip-hop is the attitude I present to the world and the aesthetic style I represent. Latino culture is what inspires me.”
A new bilingual play, REPRESENTA! chronicles what happens when Chicano spoken word poet Flores and Cuban rapper Cardenas meet in Cuba. Despite an atmosphere laden with the stereotypes and anxieties that exist between North Americans and Cubans, Flores and Cardenas struck up a friendship when they met at the Havana Hip-Hop Festival. However, their relationship, their ideals and their dreams get tested when Julio decided to stay in the U.S. while on tour in New York City right after 9/11.
“I wanted to show how Latinos are diverse in their cultural expressions through a bilingual narrative, as a hybrid piece of theater, with potential to reach a lot of different audiences,” continues Flores. “A Chicano and a Cuban-American speak different Spanish, and different English. However, this generation of Latinos is using hip-hop to transcend politics, and borders, to communicate more about life in the Americas. We are creating a new future in the process. I want to show how Latinos contribute to contemporary narrative and performance aesthetics such as hip-hop theater and spoken word. In other words, I wanted to introduce Spanglish to the hip-hop theater audience.”
Julio Cardenas was born and raised east of Havana in Alamar, Cuba -- known as the “cradle of hip-hop in Cuba” and home to the National Hip-Hop Festival. While making .35 per day as a fishery worker, in 1996 Cardenas founded the Cuban rap group RCA a/k/a Raperos Crazy de Alamar. RCA eventually became one of the best known rap groups in Cuba. After featuring in consecutive years at the Cuban National Hip-Hop Festival, in 2001 Cardenas was among the first hip-hop artists selected to travel to the United States and perform for U.S. audiences in New York City as part of the inaugural International Hip-Hop Exchange. He now lives in New York.
For this year’s San Francisco Arts Festival Cardenas will join with Paul Flores for a new performance experience: REPRESENTA! -- bilingual theatre for the hip-hop generation. Commissioned by the San Francisco International Arts Festival and La Peña Cultural Center, REPRESENTA!, directed by Danny Hoch, is a fiercely incisive commentary on terrorism, immigration, Cuba, U.S. foreign policy, Bay Area lefty culture, New York after 9/11 and pan-Latino identity. Setting itself apart from other spoken-word performance, REPRESENTA! is bilingual theatre which combines spoken-word poetry with character portrayals that are simultaneously hilariously entertaining and provocative. All performances are presented with super-title translation.
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