Perez, Beatriz (Beatriz)

Hello to all my classmates! My name is Beatriz Perez and my preferred pronouns are she/her. I am a 4th year Chicano/a Studies major and Public Policy minor. I was born in Virginia, traveled with my parents for a few years before settling down in Riverside which is about 1 hour and 15 minutes from LA (without traffic). I became interested in Chicano studies when I took 10A and loved how this class was about my struggles and I found myself relating to a lot of the material taught in that class. Since I am not really very "artsy" I figured this would be an excellent class to open my mind to the world of the arts especially to Chicano/a artists.

Going to the readings assigned for class, I found them very relatable to the exercise we did in class. In my very short list of artists, I realized I could only name a few very well known white male artist and only had one female artist, Frida Kahlo, which in the end was a tentative choice for being called a chicana artist. When we first had started the exercise, I noticed that right off the bat, the list of male artists was growing rapidly while the female list was very short. Making that list in class and then reflecting on it with the readings made me physically see the disproportion between male and female artists which is really sad. It is sad that I can name the few very well know male artists like Van Gogh and Picasso but could not do the same for my own people. It shows me the sad reality that artists of color do not get the recognition they deserve through lack of opportunities and c olor discrimination in their area of work. Not only does being an artist of color have its own obstacles but it is even harder as  FEMALE artist of color to gain any kind of recognition in the arts. If your work is not being in a museum, or being sold for thousands in prestigious auctions, chances are that it will be very difficult to have some recognition to your name. What makes me proud to be a female of color is that despite those odds, women who look just like me and have lived through what we live through fighting against the bars set upon us and breaking through those barriers in order to show the world what we have done and give us the voice that we need and deserve.