Gabriela Aceves Sepúlveda – författare

2020 Canadian Association for Latin American and Caribbean Studies (CALACS) Book PrizeIn 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.

2020 Canadian Association for Latin American and Caribbean Studies (CALACS) Book PrizeIn 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.

Premiado en 2020 como el mejor libro de Historia de la Asociación Canadiense de Estudios Latinoamericanos y del Caribe (ACELC). En el México de los años 1970, con la participación cada vez mayor de la mujer en el ámbito público y cuando el predominio de la cultura escrita cedía el paso a la comunicación audiovisual, un grupo de artistas y activistas feministas comenzó a cuestionar cómo el cuerpo femenino era visualmente construido y politizado en los medios de comunicación. Desde un marco transnacional e interdisciplinario, Gabriela Aceves Sepúlveda analiza la casi siempre ignorada influencia de las artistas y activistas feministas en la forma de representar, conceptualizar y politizar el cuerpo femenino, como reflejo del entorno tanto de la Ciudad de México como del escenario mundial de la época. A partir del concepto de "letradas visuales" que acuña la autora, se destaca la creciente participación de la mujer en esferas de influencia intelectual hasta entonces consideradas exclusivamente masculinas. La autora traza cómo el trabajo de las artistas y activistas y sus intervenciones performativas y visuales en el espacio de la ciudad feminizaron sus paisajes mediáticos, las esferas intelectuales y definieron los debates que habrían de darse en torno al cuerpo femenino, el género y la violencia sexual en las últimas décadas del siglo xx. Entretejiendo las prácticas de activistas, cineastas, artistas visuales, videógrafas y fotógrafas, Las mujeres se hacen visibles cuestiona los límites disciplinarios que históricamente han excluido a las artistas y activistas feministas de la Historia y ubica el desarrollo del feminismo mexicano de la segunda ola como un actor relevante en los entonces muy disputados espacios políticos de la Ciudad de México y a nivel internacional.