Peeling off the Skin: Representations of Alternative Spaces of Dominican Womanhood in Contemporary Visual Arts and Performance.

• In Event: Traversing Queer Bodies in Latino America

Abstract

In an attempt to transcend the understanding of current representations of female subjects as mere spaces of resistance and subversion, this presentation analyzes the instrumentality of contemporary Dominican visual arts and performance in the legitimation of alternative gender discourses. Through and exhaustive analysis that encompasses the cultural and aesthetical politics of a selection of works by a group of emerging and consolidated Dominican artists and performers, I attempt to show various approaches to the construction of identity in relation to gender. Three key questions are considered in this paper: What is the agency of these alternative interpretations of gender? How has the transnational artistic exchange between artists from the Dominican Republic and their cohorts in the United States influenced such interpretations? How do these works become –borrowing from Foucault– spaces of dissention? My study will focus on the construction of Dominican womanhood as represented in the performance Lilith (2011), the audiovisual and literary project “Mujeres sin piel” (2009), the multidisciplinary art exhibit “Doméstica Foránea” (2015), and the visual arts project “Series” (2015). I examine the reflective and revisionist character of each project. Furthermore, I pay attention to the intersections between class, race, and geography in the (re)constructions of gender images and roles in the abovementioned works.

Author

• Sharina Maillo Pozo, SUNY New Paltz