Joy Laville, Woman Walking by a Pink Wall, 1990.On View: March 8 – April 7, 2021
Within the rich cultural diversity that Mexico offers to the world, the visual arts possess a distinctive force that has crossed borders and that have made them an obligatory reference of universal art. However, as has happened in various fields, women artists have generally been under-recognized, despite their great talents and outstanding contributions to culture.
In the context of the celebrations for International Women’s Day and based on the feminist foreign policy deployed by the Government of Mexico, the Permanent Mission of Mexico to the Organization of American States (OAS), in collaboration with the AMA | Art Museum of the Americas of the OAS, presents the virtual exhibition Of Contrasts: Mexican Women and Men from the Art Museum of the Americas to make more visible the work of Mexican women that is part of the AMA collection, and to promote the commitment of the Government of Mexico to urgent substantive gender equality.
The exhibition contains 31 pieces including paintings, sculptures, and photographs. Nineteen of them are creations by Mexican women such as Olga Dondé, Carla Rippey, Olga Costa, Pilar Castañeda, Joy Laville, Carol Miller, Daisy Ascher, Tanya Kohn, Helen Escobedo, Daniela Edburg, Marta Palau, and Graciela Iturbide. The remaining 11 pieces are by Mexican men whose work is widely recognized, such as Rufino Tamayo, Manuel Felguérez, Vicente Rojo, Alberto Gironella, among others.
The Permanent Mission of Mexico to the OAS thanks the Secretariat of Foreign Relations and the AMA | Art Museum of the Americas of the OAS for making this initiative possible. In the same way, we hope that this exhibition–which is expected to be scheduled in person when sanitary conditions do so–may provide a sample of the strength and value of women in Mexican art and that its dissemination contributes to reflections on the unacceptability of the current reality of women and the need to change their destiny.
We want women on the front lines of decision-making; we want them to take the reins of the Inter-American System; we want them solving the present and designing the future that we long for–inclusive and sustainable; we want them respected, contributing their knowledge and experience; we want them taking firm strides; We want them that way, because women are half of the population, and without their equal incorporation into all sectors of life on the planet, democracy is not possible.
Ambassador Luz Elena Baños Rivas
Permanent Representative of Mexico to
the Organization of American States
- Daisy Ascher
- Arnold Belkin
- Pilar Castañeda
- Pedro Coronel
- Olga Costa
- Olga Dondé
- Daniela Edburg
- Helen Escobedo
- Manuel Felguérez
- Pedro Friedeberg
- Alberto Gironella
- Graciela Iturbide
- Tanya Kohn
- Joy Laville
- Carol Miller
- Pablo O’Higgins
- José Clemente Orozco
- José Guadalupe Posada
- Carla Rippey
- Vicente Rojo
- David Alfaro Siqueiros
- Rufino Tamayo
This exhibition is organized in collaboration with the Permanent Mission of Mexico to the OAS, with text by students of the University of Maryland Department of Art History and Archeology.
For more information, visit https://www.museum.oas.org/.
