Week 8: Border Arte

 Gloria Anzaldua begins Border Arte: Nepantla, el Lugar de la Frontera recalling her sentiments towards the exhibition of Aztec: The World of Moctezuma at the Denver Museum of Natural History. The exhibition showcases Chicanx border artists to challenge the idea that the U.S. and Mexico are cultures independent of one another by including artists who represent a mixture of both cultures in their artwork. Although this exhibition is supposed to serve as a bridge between the U.S. and Mexico, Gloria is angered due to the ignorance and insensitivity she hears throughout her experience through the exhibition; she is particularly upset about the insinuation that the Aztecs are a thing of the past when their people and culture still exist today. However, Gloria also reflected on herself and her part in passively consuming and appropriating Indigenous culture simply because she is being taught her own culture in this exhibition by whites; the irony of this act further shows us how far colonization has seeped within our current society. 

One of the artworks that Gloria encounters at the exhibition is Nepantla by Santa Barraza, which is an oil on canvas. Gloria met Barraza in the mid-1970's, which is the first time she witnessed Barraza's Virgen de Guadalupe iconography, like the one we see in Nepantla. Barraza's work at the time of this exhibition showed the reclamation of her cultural and spiritual identity as a mestiza. In addition, Napantla, like many of her other work, explores Indigenous Mexican symbols a form of resistance to the oppression and assimilation which Indigenous Mexicans' experience.