Entre lo personal y lo colectivo: Narrativas Afrodescendientes en España

Rubén H. Bermúdez, Lucía Asué Mbomío, and Silvia Albert Sopale explore Afrodescendant narratives at Spain King Juan Carlos I of Spain Center in New York City.

Join NYU’s Espacio de Culturas for an evening exploring Afrodescendant narratives in contemporary Spain. This event will bring together two of Spain’s leading voices in visual and literary arts —Rubén H. Bermúdez and Lucía Asué Mbomío— who will engage in a thought-provoking dialogue with Silvia Albert Sopale, the Spring 2025 KJC Chair at Espacio de Culturas @KJCC. The discussion will be in Spanish and moderated by Eva Copeland.

Titled Entre lo personal y lo colectivo (Between the Personal and the Collective), the event will examine how individual experiences and collective histories shape the Afrodescendant narratives that are currently emerging in Spain. Through their creative works, Bermúdez, Mbomío, and Albert delve into the complexities of Black identity, highlighting the persistence of systemic challenges faced by Afrodescendants in Spain. Their narratives also shed light on the transformative power of storytelling as a tool to combat invisibility, prejudice, and societal biases.

Rubén H. Bermúdez

Rubén H. Bermúdez (Madrid, 1981) is a visual artist known for his project Y tú, ¿por qué eres negro? (And You, Why Are You Black?), which has evolved into a photobook and the award-winning film A todos nos gusta el plátano (We All Like Bananas, 2021). He is the co-founder of Conciencia Afro, a cultural platform dedicated to raising awareness about the Black, African, and Afro-descendant community in Spain. Bermúdez has shared his expertise globally, conducting workshops and lectures at institutions such as Université Cheikh Anta Diop in Dakar, Northwestern University in Chicago, and NYU. In 2024, the Museo Reina Sofía added his work to its collection, cementing his status as a trailblazer in contemporary visual arts. Currently, he is exploring video game creation as a new medium for storytelling.

Lucía Asué Mbomío

Lucía Asué Mbomío Rubio (Madrid, 1981) is a multifaceted journalist, writer, and filmmaker. With a career spanning roles as a TV host, columnist, and documentary filmmaker, she has amplified underrepresented voices in media. Lucía’s written works include Las que se atrevieron (2017), Hija del Camino (2019) —soon to be adapted into a Netflix series— and Tierra de la Luz, a novel exploring the realities of female agricultural laborers in Europe. She has worked extensively to highlight Afrodescendant and feminist narratives through her contributions to outlets like El País, Mundo Negro, and Afroféminas. Her commitment to representation and advocacy has made her a leading figure in Spanish cultural discourse.

Silvia Albert Sopale

Silvia Albert Sopale is the Spring 2025 KJC Chair and a Spanish Afrodescendant actress, writer, and cultural organizer. Born in San Sebastián, Spain, she currently lives in Barcelona and performs in both Spanish and Catalan. She is a member of the Academy of Performing Arts of Spain and the founder and director of Periferia Cimarronas, the first Black theater in Spain. Additionally, she founded Hibiscus, the Association of Afro-Spanish and Afrodescendants, and directs the Black Barcelona Festival. She also established Tinta Negra, a collective that advocates for racial diversity in the performing arts, and is a member of t.i.c.t.a.c. (Workshop for Critical Transfeminist Antiracist Combative Interventions). Her notable works include: No es país para negras (2014), BLACKFACE y otras vergüenzas (2019), Parad de pararme (2021), Cuentos desde la Periferia (2023), Mahmud y no solo Mahmud (2023), and Lotö, Un ritual de emancipación corporal (2024).

Eva María Copeland

Eva María Copeland is Associate Professor of Spanish at Dickinson College. Born in Zaragoza, Spain, she specializes in race, gender, and national identity in Spanish cultural production from the 19th to the 21st century. Her research on writers like Benito Pérez Galdós and Afro-Spanish authors explores Blackness, belonging, and countervisual genealogies of Black identity in Spain. Her work has been published in leading academic journals, and she received the 2023 AATSP Outstanding Scholarly Publication Award. She is currently working on a book about Blackness and cultural memory in modern Spain and a project on gender, race, and empire in Eva Canel’s fiction and theatre.