This series of Amategrams (see also MMA 1983.502.2 and 1983.502.3)—totemic forms painted onto amate, paper made from bark by indigenous Otomi craftspeople in Mexico—exemplifies Mendieta’s persistent engagement with the female body and the landscape. The abstract shapes rendered in heavy black lines evoke the presence of a female life force, which Mendieta viewed as omnipresent in the natural world, a continuation of her 1970s "earth body" performances and sculptures. The woody materiality of the amate grounds Mendieta’s symbolic mark making in process, suggesting an affiliation with rituals and offerings, as well as the alchemical.
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New York. El Museo del Barrio. "Two by New," February 11–June 15, 1986, no catalogue.
New York. Hunter College Art Gallery. "Race and Representation: Art / Film / Video," January 26–March 6, 1987, unnumbered cat. (p. 38; listed together with MMA 1983.502.2 as "Amategram Series 1 & 2," 1983).
New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York. "Ana Mendieta: A Retrospective," November 20, 1987–January 24, 1988, no. 73 (as "The Vivification of the Flesh [La vivificacion de la carne]," 1981–82).
Cologne. Museum Ludwig. "Lateinamerikanische Kunst im 20. Jahrhundert," February 9–April 25, 1993, not in catalogue.
New York. El Museo del Barrio. "Caribbean: Art at the Crossroads of the World," June 12, 2012–January 6, 2013, not in catalogue.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Land Marks," April 30–August 25, 2013, no catalogue.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Drawing without Paper: Selections from The Met Collection," March 12–September 18, 2022, no catalogue.
Elizabeth Hess. "Out of Body." Village Voice (December 3, 1987), ill. p. 119 (installation photo, Exh. New York 1987–88).
Donald Kuspit. "Ana Mendieta. New Museum of Contemporary Art." Artforum 26 (February 1988), p. 144, dates it 1981–82.
Gregory Galligan. "Ana Mendieta: A Retrospective." Arts Magazine 62 (April 1988), p. 49.
Elinor W. Gadon. The Once and Future Goddess: A Symbol for Our Time. San Francisco, 1989, pp. 281, 283, fig. 144, dates it 1981–82.
H. H. Arnason. History of Modern Art: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, Photography. Ed. Marla F. Prather and Daniel Wheeler. Rev. 4th ed. (1st ed., 1968). New York, 1998, pp. 603–4, fig. 24.28.
Emily Shoyer. "Afterlives: Contemporary Art in the Byzantine Crypt." caareviews.org (July 29, 2024).
Andrea Myers Achi and Akili Tommasino. "Visualizing the Afterlife." metmuseum.org/perspectives. May 17, 2024, ill. (color, installation photo), call it "Vivification of the Flesh".
Henry Taylor (American, born Oxnard, California, 1958)
2017
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