In post-1968 Mexico a group of artists and feminist activists
began to question how feminine bodies were visually constructed and
politicized across media. Participation of women was increasing in
the public sphere, and the exclusive emphasis on written culture
was giving way to audio-visual communications. Motivated by a
desire for self-representation both visually and in politics,
female artists and activists transformed existing regimes
of media and visuality.Women Made Visible by Gabriela Aceves
Sepúlveda uses a transnational and interdisciplinary lens to
analyze the fundamental and overlooked role played by artists
and feminist activists in changing the ways female bodies were
viewed and appropriated. Through their concern for
self-representation (both visually and in formal politics), these
women played a crucial role in transforming existing regimes of
media and visuality—increasingly important intellectual spheres of
action. Foregrounding the work of female artists and their
performative and visual, rather than written, interventions in
urban space in Mexico City, Aceves Sepúlveda demonstrates that
these women feminized Mexico's mediascapes and shaped the debates
over the female body, gender difference, and sexual violence during
the last decades of the twentieth century. Weaving together the
practices of activists, filmmakers, visual artists, videographers,
and photographers, Women Made Visible questions the disciplinary
boundaries that have historically undermined the practices of
female artists and activists and locates the development of Mexican
second-wave feminism as a meaningful actor in the contested
political spaces of the era, both in Mexico City and
internationally.