CARA exhibition: blog 2

“Out of the House, the Halo, and the Whore’s Mask: The Mirror of Malinchismo” by Alicia Gaspar de Alba talks about the low representation of women in art in the exhibition CARA, the first major national exhibition of Chicano(a) art. But more specifically, it talks about sexism and stereotypes women faced withing the Chicano Movement. This writing gives a perspective of the movement through the eyes of women artists. For me, it was interesting to see how many people in my culture have a long history of a fixed mindset-Machismo. In this writing, we can see how women were criticized when they broke their expected roles. For example, women were not supposed to be artists because they needed to pay attention to their families. They were not supposed to create murals because they did not have the strength to do the hard work- they were not “mentally or physically capable” to be out doing this type of thing.  In art, when created by men, women were depicted as “humble virgins, radiant mothers, or ferociously devoted revolutionaries.” Women were not seen as good Chicanas because they were presenting themes about the female body such as abortion or menstruation, sexuality, and others. It is interesting to see how the Chicano movement was working towards equality, but there were not being supportive of women in the movement. When women created art, they were seen as anti-Chicanas, as women who sold their bodies, wannabes, and others. Machismo is still present today. This happens because men might be afraid to let women take charge. All of these beliefs have been internalized that it is hard to change them. This causes so many stereotypes and hurts women in this case.