The Afro-Descendant Woman in Latin American Diasporic Visual Art Routledge Research in Art and Race Series

By studying multiple cultural expressions of Blackness throughout different regions of the Americas, the chapters of this book consider the relationship that social and historical processes such as sovereignty and colonialism have on cultural productions made by and about Black Latin American women.

Rosita Scerbo analyzes a range of power dynamics as represented in different artistic media of the Afro-Latin/x American community, including photography, muralism, performance, paintings, and digital art. The book acknowledges that racial and gender equity cannot exist without Intersectionality and that is why the entirety of the chapters focus on cultural and visual productions exclusively created by Afro-descendant women. The Black Latin American women featured in the various chapters, spanning multiple artistic mediums and originating from various Latin American and Caribbean nations, including Mexico, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Brazil, and Cuba, collectively pursue the central aim of foregrounding the Afro-descendant woman?s experience. Simultaneously, they strive to enhance the visibility and acknowledgment of gendered Afro- diasporic culture within the Latin American context.

The book will be of interest to scholars working in art history, gender studies, women?s studies, Latin American studies, African diaspora studies, and race and ethnic studies.

Introduction: Tracing a History of Invisibility and Cultural Amnesia PART I: Intersecting Race and Gender in Afrodescendant Paintings and Murals 1. Reimagining Mythical Spaces: Spiritualized Afro-feminism and Decolonial Aesthetics in the Visual Expression of Afro-Cuban Painter Harmonia Rosales 2. Repainting Black Queer HERstory: Lesbian Femininity and Anti-Blackness Practices in the Afro-Dominican Diasporic Art of Tiffany Alfonseca 3. Visualizing Collective Identity: Daily Life and Black Femininity in the Artistry of Afro-Brazilian Painter Maria Auxiliadora da Silva 4. Let Equity Bloom: A Floral, Intersectional, and Multicultural Feminist Reading of the Mural The Roots by Afro-Mexican Contemporary Artist Cristina Martinez PART II: Discovering Agency in Black Aesthetic Expressions: Afrodescendant Women’s Authorship and Leadership in Photographic Projects and Performance 5. Captured in Frames: Exploring the Silenced Story of Afro-Mexican Women through the Lenses of Koral Carballo and Mara Sánchez Renero 6. Framing Black Girlhood in Puerto Rico: The Afrodescendant Female Body in Adriana Parrilla’s Photographic Projects 7. Afro-Colombian Women as Alternative Historical Archives: Negotiating Forms of Racialization and Invisibility in the Graphic Testimonies of Liliana Angulo Cortés 8. Afro-Cuban Diasporic Femininity: A Visual Chronicle of the Trauma of Separation and the Legacy of Enslavement in Susana Pilar's Artistry Epilogue

Rosita Scerbo is Assistant Professor of Afro-Latinx Studies and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Georgia State University.