Clare, Elijah (ZAPATA)

 In her essay, The Rise and Impact of Chicano Graphics, 1965 to Now Claudia Zapata examines how the rise of digital media impacted Chicanx movements, activism, and art. Zapata structures the essay in a loosely chronological manner, beginning her analysis with the creation of the internet and early forms of digital media such as lightboards before moving on-to contemporary digital mediums. Although Zapata moves quickly in her review of digital media and the history of the internet, condensing decades of technological advancement into a couple of pages, she is quick to note that digital media has yet to fully replace traditional mediums and she challenges the assumption that it will. A theme throughout the essay is that digital media should not be thought of as oppositional to traditional media; instead, it should be thought of and used as a tool for re-imagining and re-igniting interest in more traditional media. Another theme present throughout the essay is the juxtaposition of creating humanizing art in a seemingly dehumanizing digital medium. Although the internet can be a place of extremely close community, love and support it can also function as the opposite and can be a place of extreme dehumanization, cold communication and distance. Many of the artists discussed by Zapata actively challenge the notion that digital media inherently implies a sense of disconnection, dehumanization, or distance or at least play with the contradiction. One artist in the essay refers to computers as “like an extension of the mind” and another creates and shares extremely vulnerable moments through AR pieces. Additionally as shown by the DDoS attack/ Digital Sit-In staged by the Electronic disturbance theatre in 1998 digital forms of art and activism are not inherently disconnected from reality and vulnerability. Overall Zapata's essay is extremely interesting in its examination of digital media. Another additional note is that the essay itself sort of functions as digital activist art itself because Zapata includes a plea for justice for the transgender woman Layleen Polanco who was killed as a result of extreme medical neglect by correctional officers at Rikers Island in 2019.