CARA Politics of Representation

In the writing, Alicia Gaspar de Alba addresses the faulty representation of Chicana artists at the CARA exhibition, tracing this irresponsible representation of Chicana artists to the rampant machismo of the Chicano movement of the 60s and 70s. This patriarchy led to the subjugation of women in the movement, confining them into distinct categories that they were supposed to fall into: domesticated and motherly, whoreish, or militant chingona.They also equated

She then looks at the ways that the CARA exhibition has done the Chicana feminists artists wrong. Besides the fact that the amount of womxn artists in the exhibition was minuscule, women's art was separated into its own room meaning that their art is seen as separate from mainstream Chicano politics. This spatial segregation from the rest of the exhibit also is strategically placed in between the "Redefining American Art" and "Reclaiming the past" sending a subliminal message of women's reproduction as being between the past and present.

She then goes on to analyze the artwork of the Chicanas in the exhibition and notices the way that the artists use the iconography of La Virgen, La Llorana, and La Malinche and how these three folk figures factor into their identities as Chicanas.

This critique of Chicana art representation in CARA is important because it identifies the issues faced by Chicana artists in exhibitions and galleries. It's interesting to note that recently, the Hammer museum held an entire exhibition and gallery to Latina art called Latinas Out Loud. The discourse and Latina/Chicana art representation has been carried far enough that Latinas/Chicanas are being dedicated their own art shows in the present day.