Plans for museum for Hispanic artists take a large step forward

Judy Odierna

Tuesday, Dec. 31, 2002 | 5:41 a.m.

NEW YEAR'S EDITION

Jan. 1, 2003

What started as a personal artwork collection in a single glass cabinet has now grown into a permanent location for the Hispanic Museum of Nevada.

The museum will celebrate the grand opening of its new facility with dinner and a musical extravaganza at 6 p.m. Friday at the Las Vegas Community Senior Center, 250 N. Eastern Ave.

There will be eight local artists whose works will be on display in the ballroom and within the museum.

The event also kicks off the first Festival of the Cuatro -- a mix of workshops and performances celebrating the folkloric instruments and music of the mountains of Puerto Rico.

"This is a stepping stone," said Lynnette Sawyer, executive director for the museum. "We appreciate the gesture of giving us a starting point, but in order to attract major exhibits we need to have a larger venue."

While Sawyer hopes the museum will be housed in its own building one day, she is thrilled that the works of local Hispanic artists now have a permanent home.

Census data suggest Las Vegas is one of the fastest-growing destinations for Hispanic immigrants outside the nation's established Hispanic metropolitan areas. In 2000, Hispanics in Clark County totaled more than 320,000 and comprised 21 percent of the Las Vegas Valley's population.

"It started out 10 years ago at St. Christopher Catholic School because I was teaching there," Sawyer said. "There was a cabinet in the school and the glass was broken, and I approached the principal about fixing the glass, and then I just put my own personal things in there."

Sawyer said it wasn't until 1991 when the group established a board of directors.

"It was still slow going then," Sawyer said. "It allowed us to move into the Rafael Riviera Community Center when that opened. But all the time we were growing in programming."

Art since that time hung in the hallways of the community center and various other locations in the the city. When the Senior Center finally came to fruition with the help of Las Vegas Councilman Gary Reese, a small space was made for the museum.

"It's good for the community," Reese said. "It's a place where the Hispanic community will be able to show their work and go to the senior center to see it. It is one of the components that will make the senior center viable."

The center's partnership with the museum has also helped with cultural programing the museum offers, like this weekend's Cuatro Festival.

Many of the festival's workshops and the opening night's performance will take place at the center. A musical presentation of all of the Puerto Rican artists will take place at 7:30 p.m. Saturday at the West Las Vegas Library Theater, 951 W. Lake Mead Blvd.

"We went to Puerto Rico in July, my wife and I, and visited with friends who make the Cuatro instruments from scratch," said Edwin Aponte, who with his wife, Maria, helped to coordinate the event. "And we were talking about how there is nothing here folkloric. These guys are some of the top musicians around."

Performers will include Rolando Cappas, one of the most versatile and talented pianists in Puerto Rico; Kacho Montalvo, a music performer, composer and producer who has worked with Marc Anthony and other stars; and Reinaldito Alvarado, a 12-year-old who has put out two CDs and will play the child part of famous Salsa singer Hector Lavoe in a movie based on his life.

"The museum was more than happy to bring any type of Latin-American culture to this town," Aponte said. "Sawyer is really the heart of the Hispanic Museum. She has a vision and is working toward it. She has worked without a facility for more than a decade and at least now she has a home.""