week 4

The readings on Rasquachismo and Domesticana were very interesting because they brought to my attention that the day-to-day things I see in my culture and community inspired an art technique. Like other art in the Chicano art movement, Rasquachismo functioned as a form of resistance. Rasquachismo as an art style was a response to how Chicana/o creatives and their artwork  were perceived by the Anglo-American art world. It took the “signs and symbols” that those from the dominant culture marked as unworthy or defects and transformed or adapted them as markers of cultural and community pride. Rasquachismo essentially reminded me of how my Abue would wash the glass cups that some candles came in and save them as regular cups or how we use save the butter containers for salsas. It reminded me of how sometimes we put water in the shampoo bottles para que rinda or save up old shirt as trapos to clean.

The Domesticana chapter, however, was the one that really impressed me because I had never sat and thought about the altares at home as a form of artistic and cultural expression for Chicanas. To me it was a normal everyday thing, and while reading it I kept thinking back to the shelf my mother adorns and cared for with pride. She has everything from recuerdos, candles and flowers on the top shelf, miniature figures, a small pile of mexican coins-pesos, and photos of both the living and dead.  I am constantly impressed at the things Chicana/o artists took inspiration from and the ways they created their own language.