The University of Wisconsin–Madison Arts Institute’s Madison Early Music Festival (MEMF) was recently awarded the Hispanex Program (Programa Hispanex) grant of approximately $14,000 from the Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports (Ministerio de Educación, Cultura Y Deporte – Secretaría de Estado de Cultura).
The Spanish government funds the Hispanex Program grant to promote Spanish culture and language to people in the foreign academic field, through publications, research, studies, meetings, conferences and work trips, as well as Spanish cultural projects. The grant supports research and cultural cooperation between Spain and the United States, Japan, the Philippines, Spanish Pacific Islands, South Korea, Australia, Germany, Poland, Portugal, United Kingdom, Hungary and Morocco.
The Madison Early Music Festival received a grant for this year’s theme, “Quixotic Musical Treasures from the Golden Age of Spain,” that celebrated over 400 years of the novel “Don Quixote de la Mancha” by Miguel de Cervantes. MEMF explored the wealth of references to the music, art and literature that flourished and illuminated Renaissance Spain during the political rise and fall of the Spanish Habsburg Dynasty. Featured artists were Xavier Díaz-Latorre, Daphna Mor & Kane Mathis Duo, Sonnambula and Piffaro, The Renaissance Band. Over 90 workshop participants and 2,700 people attended concerts, lectures and the dance to learn more about this historic period and iconic figures.
Additional grant funding came from the UW–Madison Anonymous Fund; UW–Madison Latin American, Caribbean and Iberian (LACIS) Program’s Cyril W. Nave Fund; the University Lectures Committee; The Evjue Foundation, Inc.; and Dane Arts with additional funds from the Endres Mfg. Company Foundation, The Evjue Foundation, Inc., charitable arm of The Capital Times, the W. Jerome Frautschi Foundation and the Pleasant T. Rowland Foundation. For a full list of organizational supporters and endowed funds, visit the website.
Edith Beltran Minehan (Ph.D. in Spanish, UW–Madison 2015) translated the grant entirely in Spanish. The LACIS Program, 2017 Festival supporter, recommended Minehan for this translation based on her research and writing skills.