A Wall of One’s Own : Latinas Reclaiming Spaces, Subverting Economies, Empowering Communities

Abstract

ABSTRACT: This article analyzes issues of gender, space, and ethnicity in three different pieces: Coco Fusco’s performance A Room of One’s Own: Women and Power in the New America (2006), the mural painting Latino America (1974) by the Las Mujeres Muralistas group, and the Venas de la Mujer installation (1976) at the LA Women’s Building by the Las Chicanas group. Though created in two different temporal contexts, the three pieces are connected by Virginia Woolf’s idea of the space as “room of one’s own,” and thus share an understanding of the complexity of issues, such as female creativity, the portrayal of/appropriation by women of spaces traditionally considered to be masculine, and the ephemerality of certain artistic media. By studying the three pieces in their geographical, social, and artistic context, I intend to demonstrate that issues denounced by the Chicano Civil Rights Movement (also known as El Movimiento) and the Feminist Movement in the 1970s are still unresolved in 21st century America.