I am a musicologist and curator, passionate about the interrelationship of the arts and culture. I am the author of a ground-breaking book on the significance of music in the work of modernist painter, writer and sculptor Alejandro Xul Solar, and the editor of a critical volume on artistic migrations and convergences in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. My latest research explores multimodal aesthetics and politics of identity, nation, gender, and representation in popular song in North America (1920s) and Argentina (1960s), as well as innovative ways of performing and sharing music.

I started my musical career as a guitar performer and tutor, which is why performance studies are also part of my interests. I lived in Paris and London, studying at the Université de Paris-Sorbonne, where I received my BMus, MMus and PhD in History of Music and Musicology. I was tenured professor in Universidad Nacional del Litoral in Santa Fe for a decade before moving to Canada with my family. I teach courses on popular and contemporary music and media, aesthetics, gender, technology, and culture at Ryerson University and Wilfrid Laurier University.

Exploring the relationship across music, visual culture, and literature in modernism and contemporary art, my research has now been gravitating towards issues of gender and technological innovation.

I have explored music and gender in an exhibition presented at Ryerson University's Modern Literature and Culture Research Centre Gallery, that you can visit here. In this project, I combined archive sheet music with sound sculptures by Canadian artist Marla Hlady. I also investigated on the significance of music and sound in Florine Stettheimer’s paintings and poems. Other projects are focused on an iconic Argentine popular song, “Alfonsina y el mar”, and on 1920s American and Canadian popular song sheet music related to gender relations.

In Visual Music, an innovative research-creation project that I am leading as a partnership between Ryerson University and the National Arts Centre Orchestra (SSHRC PEG 2020), we are studying the impact of COVID-19 social restrictions on orchestras and designing creative digital ways to enhance orchestral music audience remote engagement.

I have pioneered the musicological field of interrelationship of the arts in Argentina, proposing a typology to analyze the migrations and convergences between music and visual culture. My scholarship on the significance of music in the work of modernist painter, writer and sculptor Alejandro Xul Solar was recognized by its contribution to the fields of musicology (Distinguished Mention in the I Gourmet Musical International Competition in Research on Latin American Music) as well as art critique (Best Essay of the Year, Argentine Association of Art Critics), both in Buenos Aires. The book I wrote on this topic is now in its third edition.

As a guitar performer, I was awarded first prize in a local competition in my hometown (Rosario), and later received a scholarship from the Spanish government to participate in the prestigious International Summer Course on Spanish Music “Música en Compostela.”

I have supervised more than fifty undergraduate dissertations on a wide variety of topics (ranging from tango to hip hop, from Indigenous music to performance practice issues, from Igor Stravinsky to Leo Brouwer, from afro-Argentinian candombe to vocal techniques in contemporary music), as well as a Master in Media Production Research Project on popular music during COVID-19. I am currently supervising a doctoral dissertation on sound art.

Books

• Cristia, Cintia. Xul Solar, un músico visual. La música en su vida y obra. Buenos Aires: Gourmet    Musical Ediciones, 2007.  Watch a videoabout the third edition of this book
• Cristia, Cintia. Intercambios entre música y pintura: creación, reflexión y pedagogía. Santa Fe: Editorial UNL, 2010. 

Edited Volumes

• Cristia, Cintia (ed.). Migraciones y convergencias: Estudios sobre la interrelación de las artes en los siglos XX y XXI. Santa Fe: Editorial UNL, 2017.

Book Chapters

• Cristiá, Cintia , “Murray Adaskin’s Duo for Viola and Guitar: Issues of Authorship, Guitar, and Performance.” In Bornstein, Eli, Sheila Kreyszig, and Walter Kreyszig (eds.) The Vision of Murray Adaskin (1906-2002): His Contributions to the Musical Scene of Canada and Beyond. .  In press.
• Cristiá, Cintia. “Painting Jazz: Music, Rhythm, and Sound in the Work of Florine Stettheimer”, in Irene Gammel and Suzanne Zelazo (eds.), Florine Stettheimer: A New Multimodal Modernism. Toronto: Book*hug, 2019: 230-252.
• Cristiá, Cintia. “Xul Solar y la música: la reunión de las artes.” In Artundo, Patricia M. (ed.), Xul Solar: Visions and revelations. Buenos Aires: MALBA, 2005: 60-9.

Scholarly Articles

• Cristia, Cintia. “Music and the Visual Arts”, Bibliographic Article for Oxford Bibliographies Online, Oxford University Press. 2022. Invited, under contract.
• Cristia, Cintia. “Under the Sea: Gender, Nation, and Identity in and around the song ‘Alfonsina y el mar’”. Twentieth Century Music. 2022. In press.  
• Cristia, Cintia. “Acción política, plástica y música: Brumade Jorge Horst.” Revista Materia Artística, Universidad Nacional de Rosario, 1.1 (2015): 208-27.
• Cristia, Cintia. “On the Interrelationship between Music and Visual Art on the Twentieth and Twenty-first Centuries: A Possible Typology Derived from Cases Originated in Argentinean Artistic Field.” Transcultural Music Review, 16 (2012).
• Cristia, Cintia. “Adorno, Souriau y algunas consideraciones acerca del marco teórico-metodológico.” Revista del Instituto Superior de Música, 13 (2011): 9-28. 
• Cristia, Cintia. “Pintura y literatura en el Concierto para piano Hoffmanneske Geschichte: das klingende Glas de Luis Mucillo.” Revista Argentina de Musicología, 10 (2010): 111-36.

Exhibitions

• “Domestic Music-Making: From Parlour Music to Digital Sound”, MLCRC Gallery, Ryerson University. September-December 2019. See some images here. Co-curated by Dr. Irene Gammel, with works by Marla Hlady.
• ”Diálogo de musas: Música y artes visuales.” OSDE Foundation, Argentina. September–December, 2013.

Lecture-Recitals

• “Artistic Spaces: Literature and Painting in Tale à la Hoffmann: The Ringing Glass, by Luis Mucillo (Argentina, 1956)”. Lecture - recital by Cintia Cristia and Alexander Panizza, presented at MusCan 2018 Conference, MacEwan University, Edmonton.

Even if this is my first year at Laurier, I am already impressed by the sense of community that is prevalent in campus. I also find that the students are very participative and eager to learn, which helps to create the right energy in class to be able to explore together the proposed material and make it relevant to their own interests.