Amalia Mesa-Bains | |
|---|---|
| Born | July 10, 1943 |
| Known for | Chicano art installations |
| Awards | San Francisco Mission Cultural Center's Award of Honor Association of American Cultures' Artist Award Chicana Foundation of Northern California's Distinguished Working Women Award San Francisco Mission Cultural Center's Award of Honor Visionary Woman Award, Moore College of Art & Design MacArthur Fellowship |
| Website | Amaliamesabains.com |
Amalia Mesa-Bains (born July 10, 1943),[1] is a Chicana curator, author, visual artist, and educator. She is best known for her large-scale installations that reference home altars and ofrendas. Her work engages in a conceptual exploration of Mexican American women's spiritual practices that addresses colonial and imperial histories of display, the recovery of cultural memory, and their roles in identity formation.[2]
In her writing, she examines the formation of Chicana identity and aesthetic practices, the shared experiences of historically marginalized communities in the United States, especially among women of color, and the role of multiculturalism within museums and cultural institutions. Her essay, "Domesticana: The Sensibility of Chicana Rasquache," theorized domesticana as a set of aesthetic strategies that use spaces and experiences historically associated with Mexican American women as sites for Chicana feminist reclamation.[3]