final thoughts

I loved this class and learned so much from our discussion and presentations. In fact, our discussions and even debates were probably my favorite part of class because we were able to engage in and with the work and respective artists. Additionally, I loved looking at and learning about the artwork. It was a real treat having time to look and reflect on artwork that was made by Chicanas. We also had time to think about history, and its production, identity and Chicana women’s concerns, which is all too rare in the academy. All of these things I relished! Additionally, our discussions pushed me to think about Chicana theory and subjectivity more closely. They propelled me to analyze and apply theories and ideas by Gloria Anzaldúa and others. As such, our discussions have helped and overlapped with my other seminars, adding depth to my lens and reach.  

There are several artists whose work blew me away (for better or worse)! Some of them were Laura Aguilar, Shizu Salamando, Delilah Montoya, Sandra de la Loza and others, but Carlee Fernandez is the one. What I mean by that is that I see Fernandez as a problematic artist, but one I will continue to think, talk and write about. Her position on her ontological process is very curious to me, and eventually, I’d love to write to her and interview her for my research. But if it wasn’t for this class, I might not have known about her, I wouldn’t have participated in the rich discussions we had and those discussions wouldn’t have informed my research interests in other seminars. I have to say thanks for that! This class was great!

In the reading, Holly Barnett-Sanchez, an important Chicana/Latina art historian, discusses how printmaking was significant medium within El Movimiento. She mentions that for Chicanas, printmaking was a means for connecting beyond the local, moving “regionally and globally” (118) As such, this medium that created fine art pieces and posters and postcards was utilized to advance a movement, and in doing so, they were also carving out their space within the art historical cannon.  

One of the Chicana printmakers that I loved was Favianna Rodríguez, a young artist and activist from the Bay Area. Rodríguez’s Pussy Power series really amazes me. Looking at her images is such a pleasure because she uses her anger and energy. She is unapologetic when she says the word “pussy”, and urgently demands social change and social justice. She combines her practice of printmaking to put together powerful messages of liberation and decolonization for women and others. From an aesthetic perspective, her works are so pleasing to look at. They are bright and unusual; they are juicy and ripe, full of life and life’s messages. Her round figures, color contrasts and warm colors contrast beautifully with her hot and sharp messages that denounce hate, war, hunger and greed.  

Hormigas

In Carmen Lomas Garza’s paintings Hormigas, she presents us with an image of a girl and boy who are feeding ants to a small animal. This image is significant to Lomas Garza’s development because it was an impetus for some of her other laser-cut artworks. While the technological shift is significant, for me, the work is special because it is so familiar. It reminds me of the many times that I have played with ants and other animals in nature. It reminds me of times that my brothers, neighbors and I would play baseball, climb trees, play tag and have adventures. In that sense, the painting is meaningful to many people.

The image also highlights the cactus plant and its pears, which underscore life and nature. Moreover, the painting captures a moment in nature. Additionally, the composition within the image points us to the hormiga. The girl in pink is highest while the boy kneels down; the stick in his hand makes us look at the single red ant he picked up. Lomas Garza uses angles to draw our eye to the smallest of creatures in nature: the ant.

I believe the critique of Lomas Garza’s works as folk or kitsch is reductive and fetishizing (and possibly racist and sexist). The assertion that her work is not sophisticated relies on the hegemonic rhetoric that asserts that art should look a certain way: there are “wrong” and “right” ways to paint. Lomas Garza moves beyond artistic hegemony by painting in her own style while she privileges her own memories and experiences. While the painting is simple in its depiction of youths looking at ants, it is significant to many.

Dear Carlee

Dear Carlee,

I’ve been thinking about some of your images, themes and even some of your words (from interviews) and I am both amazed and confused. I wonder about your use of taxidermy as a medium; are they ready-mades? Or perhaps the creation is in your vision, arrangement, and instillation of the different taxidermy objects. I ask these questions as a way of understanding your process and your feelings. I firmly believe that art can be anything; I believe that art can embody contradiction, so I do not question the validity of your work, just the meaning or context to it. I also wonder what you image the reception of your taxidermy art to look like.

I have also been thinking about some things you said in an interview with Howard Fox in 2008. These topics are more sensitive and personal, so I aim to treat them with highest respect. When discussing your photographic series, MAN, you say, “These men, the work that they’ve made, I see that as very powering…my inspiration, my connection to man, my wanting to be more male and how I could portray that…” I am again left with many questions: I wonder about the circumstances around you wanting to be male. Do you mean that in a literal way or is that more of an expression of something else? Does your education of (white) men’s artistic practice and career inform your statement? Does your series MAN discuss your own gendered identity?

Finally, I wonder about your discussion of your mixed heritage as it relates to your identity. Like you, I have one Chicano parent (my father), and that has, at times, been confusing or difficult to negotiate. I have thought about my own identity for years, wondering if I am legit enough to be all of me. Nevertheless, my question is around your participation in the Phantom Sightings exhibition at LACMA. I wonder what the message is around an idea of a Chicano Movement that is now pronounced over. What happens when people who do not identify as Chicana participate in an exhibition that declares that El Movimiento (and Chicano Art) are now only phantoms? What was or is your desire in participating in this show?

Best,

Kaelyn

Response to Edwin Arzeta

Our classmate, Edwin Arzeta, made a beautiful comment in his post last week and I wanted to add to that discussion. His post was about Laura Aguilar and Carlee Fernandez, two artists that we analyzed. While he and I share the belief that Aguilar’s photographs are beautiful, he offered a personal insight that I find to be valid in its own right, but also valuable to us as young scholars and critical thinkers. He admired her “search for the credibility of identity”, which is an amazing task.

 With both artists, he discussed how he was inspired to consider his own abilities, and to develop an aesthetic that can affect change. Yet in his analysis of Fernandez, he discussed, in more specific terms, how he was moved to consider his own art practice with respect to his identity and social politics. He went on to say that while he is not embarrassed of ashamed to identify as gay or Chicano, he recognizes the responsibility in such terms and was not yet ready to demonstrate a praxis that embodied the possible meanings of said identities. Edwin says, “Rather, I felt there was a responsibility of using those labels...like I was too naive to be able to claim them, so instead I created art that was/is devoid of the identity of any one kind of person.” This is an interesting and important thought, yet I believe it begs for further questioning: What kind of art does a gay artist make? What kind of art does a Chicano artist make? Even these questions are complicit in the essentializing framework that codifies us, so we must remember that life is complex and complicated. Our identities may contradict or change over time, we may develop or regress, but one thing is for sure, we’re nuanced beings.  

Presentations from last week

Last week all the presentations were exciting and thought provoking, but the two that stuck with me centered on Laura Aguilar and Carlee Fernandez. I was struck by the beauty of Aguilar's photographs, and by the poetry she spoke about them. Her discussion of the happiness she experiences from the images was transcendent; it was a gift to hear her speak so candidly about her own images and body. Some of my questions about her visual metaphors were later addressed, and I was excited to see some of her methods and techniques that are (in some ways) based in ancient traditions around land, mythology and the female earth: mother earth.

             As for Fernandez, I was stirred by her ideas around Chicanidad and self-hood. I speculate that her own biography has informed her artistic practice (as is the case with all artists), and wonder who introduced this idea of post-Chicana/o to her. I think there are lots of factors that we must consider with this concept and term. First, I aim to question the linguistic application of the prefix “post”. The application of such prefixes is not new or rare in (Western, Anglophone) art history, and so I submit that this term must be analyzed from a more heterogeneous lens. Secondly, I wonder about the conceptualization of such a term and its goal. What or who does this term serve? What is at stake when we conceptualize Chicana/o art as a movement that is now over? And if it is, in fact, over and Fernandez wants to create space between herself and said movement, then why would she use such a reflexive index? The very inclusion of the word “Chicana/o” situates her within a Chicana/o trajectory. While I understand and appreciate the position she may hold about not being tokenized or taken for granted. Nevertheless, I think that she needs to consider her positionality and politics as an artist and public figure.

Week Four Presnetation: Martha Ramirez

I really appreciated the presentation on Martha Ramirez because Pablo, the presenter, included some important details about the artist and her practice. I was moved to know that Ramirez doesn't use the terms "deity" or "god" because they refer to or reinforce Western colonial interpretations of power. Instead, she uses terms like, "force" or "energy". For me, the explanation of such terminology was incredibly moving and poignant because it leads me to wonder how colonized our languages and concepts are. Additionally, this reflection on language demonstrates that Ramirez is not only knowledgeable in indigenous traditions, but that indigenous traditions and sensibilities are central to her art making practice and her ways of understanding the world. Her consciousness as an artist serves not only herself, but also those of us who are working to decolonize our minds and lives.

Pablo also mentioned that Ramirez trained under the famous master muralist, David Alfaro Siqueiros. This information helped me to situate Ramirez in time and frame her education, training, and politics. As for the artworks that we saw, I noted that she has made art in México and the United States. This made an impression on me because I am still considering what it is to be a Chicana artist, and I think land and geography place a role in the construction of identity. Nevertheless, I thought it was a strong presentation and appreciated the material that was covered.  

Stencil

I wasn’t sure what to make a stencil of, but I knew I wanted to make a strong image. I decided to make a hummingbird because I have an affinity with them so I made one with a speech scroll over her head. To me, this hummingbird represents resilience and focus. In some cultures, hummingbirds are and have been associated with warriors and protectors. This bird stencil reminds me that making art can be challenging as we dig deep to develop work that is meaningful and purpose-driven. The speech scroll is also very significant because it is a Mexica glyphic that refers to speech, song or poetry. In this way, the bird and speech scroll begin to weave a narrative of a strong warrior bird singing or humming.

I also made a stencil of a vagina with two speech scrolls on its sides. I really like this image of the vagina because it’s very beautiful and flowery. I think it is also a strong image that refers to feminine power and anatomy—the power within. The speech scrolls in this image function as a way to give speech to the vagina as if it could address us directly in song or poetry, while it simultaneously addresses us visually.

Week 2

When I was growing up, my grandma had a print of The Last Supper in the dining room—in fact, it’s still hanging there. We saw it every time we ate. I knew the story of Christ’s last supper when I was little, but it wasn’t until I was an undergrad that I recognized the image and what it stood for in (Western) art history. When I could put it together in historical terms I thought it was kind of cool that my grandma had it. But the older I got, the more questions I had about it.

During his last supper, Christ tells his disciples that one of them will betray him. The painting captures the disciples’ respond to the news. They all have difference expressions and gestures, so we as viewers get a sense of their personality or disposition. Leonardo’s rendition of the moment is the most famous, and has been the subject of some popular culture interest with The Di Vinci Code films and books.

I certainly have doubts about the story and the painting. Generally, I doubt that Christ existed, but I also wonder why Christ and his disciples all look Italian? I understand that religious figures usually look like the people who worship them, but my family doesn’t look Italian. Why did my grandma have The Last Supper and not something that was more personal? What does it mean that we look at this moment of betrayal while we eat?

I think of Asco’s First Supper After a Major Riot as a great parallel. At least in terms of chronology, Asco’s work is much more relevant to me. It also took place in Los Angeles, not Milan. First Supper is also a responsive work, not a prophetic interpretation, which, to me, seems more honest.

Rodríguez, Kaelyn

My name is Kaelyn Rodríguez and I am a first year Ph.D candidate in Chicana/o Studies. My background is in art history, but some of my politics and interests are in street art, public art, murals, critical race theory, urban planning and social justice. 

I have a few questions about the essay, Out of the House, the Halo, and the Whore’s Mask: The Mirror of Malinchismo. The essay discusses the ways that Chicanas were discriminated against and underrepresented in the CARA exhibition. The author of the essay, Alicia Gaspar de Alba, makes the point that Chicanas, especially Chicana lesbians and queer women, were not only under represented in an exhibition that was interested in, “an awareness of gender issues in all aspects of the exhibition…” but somehow, heteropatriarchy was the tone of several of the respective exhibition rooms. For this, my question is: how does this contradiction occur and exist so pervasively in an exhibition that is specifically interested in resistance and affirmation for Chicanas and Chicanos? Who was the curator? I wonder who was on the Advisory Committee and how involved they were with the processes of gather art and displaying it. My next question is more interested in how “some members of the Movement were more equal than others”. I appreciate the parallel to Orwell’s Animal Farm, but I wonder why there wasn’t more advocacy for actual Chicana feminism (that was not steeped in heteropatriarchy and machismo), especially lesbian Chicanas in the exhibition. And finally, why did Eva Sperling Cockcroft think that this was a successful exhibition for Chicanas? Is that an indication that we are not united on what equality means? Are some of us still operating in patriarchal logics? Are we still trying to wear “The Halo”?

In the essay, There’s No Place Like Aztlán: Homeland Myths and Embodied Aesthetics, Alicia Gaspar de Alba refers to Homi Bhabha who talks about identity as what goes beyond the present where the “subject negotiates her/his differences”. In her essay, Chicana Feminism: In the tracks of “the” native woman, Norma Alarcón talks about Chicana identity as “…ideological conflict of having  ‘no names’ having ‘many names’ not ‘know[ing] her names’ and being someone else’s ‘dreamwork.’” Both Bhabha and Alarcón are presenting what I see as two similar ideas about existing and not existing. I understand Chicana feminism and Aztlán as place-based identities or experiences that may be mythical and not necessarily wholly based in a present space that is perfect. My question for Professor Gaspar de Alba is about Aztlán as a sort of placeholder for the intangible aesthetics of Chicana and Chicano identity and the politics behind the geographies we do and do not see (or geographies that may or may not exist). If we think about Aztlán as a metaphor for belonging and having, can we think of Chicinadad as a parallel that is both in our minds and in the future (as in “the future perfect”)? Or can we think of Chicanidad as a more permanent or localized experience?    

Margarita Cabrera

I'm presenting on Margarita Cabrera