Duarte, Andres (Andres)

My name is Andres Duarte. My preferred pronouns are he/him. I am currently a 5th Year Spanish, Community & Culture Major and I work in an after-school program in a predominantly Latinx community. I was born and raised here in Los Angeles. My mother's family is from Ecuador and my father's family is from Mexico. Though I have had many opportunities to visit Ecuador, I dream of being able to visit many different parts of Mexico. My goal after college is to become a teacher working with children in predominantly Latinx communities. My mother was a teacher, so school was an important part of every aspect of my life. The reason I am interested in this class is because I am tired of seeing artists that do not represent me. Growing up in America, we are taught about these famous European artists and from this point our idea of what can be considered art is immediately skewed. Only learning about the forms of art of one single race, in this case white Europeans, not only changes how we perceive other types of art, but actively colonizes our minds against them. I am excited for this course because I want to see "unconventional" forms of art that will truly make me wonder why I had never considered why this could be done. One of the readings that particularly interested me was the "Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?". I found this article so interesting because I had never really considered this question. I've heard of artists such as Frida Kahlo, but my knowledge of female artists ends there. I had never considered the amount of privilege it takes to achieve the same level of fame that most of these male artists achieve. Even the idea of what can be considered art is exclusionary and at times directly hinders female artists.