The Defeated (2021)

With COVID-19, the inequality the Latino, Asian, and Black communities suffer in New York became exigent. A problem extending since the Colonization and which prompted me to make this piece. With this dystopian watercolor composition, I seek to provoke the viewer and start a discussion about the mistreatment of these communities.

​To understand why Colonization is the start of this social behavior we need to look at humankind's history. The encounter with the American Continent happened in 1492, just as the Porto-Renaissance laid the foundations for the High Renaissance (16th Century) ideals. It was also the time for Renaissance Humanism which established that education in the classical tradition was essential to forge virtuous humans that were good and sought the good for their societies. Later on in the Enlightenment (18th Century), Rousseau stated that the innate human condition was good but corrupted by societies. However, even with all this interest in human nature, what happened at the time in the “New World” showed an opposing, and perhaps more accurate nature of humanity. In 1521, Cortés invaded the Mexica Capital of Tenochtitlán; a city which ultimately fell and Viceroyalties were established. During this time, it was when Pope Paul III made the Sublimis Deus, an edict that established that Amerindians were “human-enough” and therefore they could be evangelized. Since then, indigenous communities, as well as minorities have faced inequity of resources, treatment, and opportunity. The project takes the form of an altarpiece, an artwork linked to depictions of the Holy. Like Otto Dix’s Der Krieg (The War), my tryptic portrays the horrible truth, in my case, of discrimination. To highlight that, each subject occupies a separate section, similar to Las Castas a Viceroy of New Spain painting used to label and set the hierarchy of non-white and mixed-race individuals). World governments still use this hierarchy today to segregate Latinos, Asians, and people of color. In casta paintings, Spaniards enjoyed the highest position; to evoke that, the upper panel has the white hand. It also refers to Michelangelo's The Creation of Adam, but God creates these individuals of different ethnicities instead of the white Adam. It is also a reflection of how the Renaissance was considered a period of knowledge and humanism, yet, nine years after Michelangelo finished the Sistine Chapel, Cortes founded a Viceroy based on massacre and obliteration.

​On the lower panel, the crown of Isabella I of Castile lies in a skull. She was a devoted Catholic and the patron of Columbus’ expedition. In the opposite corner, England’s flag is behind a hand that pulls the black man's shackles.

​In the center panel, an Asian woman. The community occupies the center panel due to the harassment they suffer during the Pandemic. It also gave me a chance to address gender inequity. The woman shakes off the lotus shoe of binding tradition. In it, young girls’ feet were broken and bonded as a symbol of beauty and status, a guaranteed marriage. The practice was painful and disabling, a perverse objectification of women. Below her, in the lower panel, the other lotus shoe falls beside the hip bone. She also has her menses showing how patriarchy has made her ashamed of her body and enslaves her to the male gaze as the hanfu drapes her figure.

​The stigmata in the Mexica Emperor is a symbol of the massacre that evangelization meant for Latin America. His feathered headdress takes after Moctezuma’s because it was the crown of the ruler in the empire, the Huey tlatoani. The headdress is living proof of trade between the Mexica and the region of Costa Rica because the quetzal is not endemic to Mexico.

​The tight shackles injure the black man; some chains are broken, while others are still heavy. It of course refers to the long slavery of the African people in the Americas and the world. Not only were they plucked from their communities but also deem equal to non-sentient species for centuries. That upsetting conception of making them lesser than white people is unfortunately not eradicated yet, as contemporary events show.

​Instead of the Garden of Eden, the figures swim in a blood ocean filled with their wounds that flood New York City. It is very dimly painted in a wash, because those differences still torture these communities, setting them below the white man. 

​Lastly, I named the piece The Defeated, after the book La Vision de Los Vencidos (literal translation: The Vision of the Defeated, official translation: The Broken Spears) by Miguel León Portilla. A text retelling the conquest from the eyes of those who lost, the Mexica (Aztecs). Their weapons did not break, settlers slaughtered them. No other title seemed appropriate since I take this perspective; of those who have fallen. 

Bibliography

• Amandolare, S. (2020, June). Under Threat & Left Out: NYC's Immigrants and the Coronavirus Crisis. Center for an Urban Future (CUF). https://nycfuture.org/research/under-threat-and-left-out. Bailey, Gauvin A. Art of Colonial Latin America. London: Phaidon Press, 2014.

• Bailey, Gauvin A. Art of Colonial Latin America. Phaidon Press, 2014.

• Dan Keating, Ariana Eunjung Cha. “'I Just Pray God Will Help Me': Racial, Ethnic Minorities Reel from Higher Covid-19 Death Rates.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 20 Nov. 2020, www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/health/covid-race-mortality-rate/.

• Kleiner, Fred S. Gardner’s Art Through the Ages the Western Perspective. 1. Vol. 1. CENGAGE LEARNING, 2020.

• Kleiner, Fred S. Gardner’s Art Through the Ages the Western Perspective. 2. Vol. 2. CENGAGE LEARNING, 2020.

• Lai Afong, A Chinese Golden Lily Foot (Chinese Woman with Deformed Foot), c.1870s, photography, 1,706 × 1,959 (pixels).

• Las castas. (Casta Paintings),18th century, oil on canvas, 148×104 cm, Museo Nacional del Virreinato, Tepotzotlán, Mexico.

• Loweree, Jorge, Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, and Walter Ewing. “The Impact of COVID-19 on Noncitizens and Across the U.S. Immigration System.” American Immigration Council, January 5, 2021. https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/impact-covid-19-us-immigration-system.

• MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI, “THE CREATION OF ADAM” FROM THE GENESIS, C. 1512, FRESCO, 9.2 X 18.8 (FEET)