''Untitled (Rape Scene)'' is a color photograph documentation created from a 35mm slide by Cuban American artist Ana Mendieta. She made it during an April 1973

performance A performance is an act of staging or presenting a play, concert, or other form of entertainment. It is also defined as the action or process of carrying out or accomplishing an action, task, or function. Management science In the work place ...

while still a student at the University of Iowa. It is one of three photographs she created in reaction to the rape and murder of a woman on campus. The Tate Gallery in London, which owns the work, describes it this way:

Mendieta invited her fellow students to her apartment where, through a door left purposefully ajar, they found her in the position recorded in this photograph, which recreated the scene as reported in the press. Some time later, Mendieta recalled that her audience "all sat down, and started talking about it. I didn’t move. I stayed in position about an hour. It really jolted them." In 1980, she commented that the rape had "moved and frightened" her, elaborating: "I think all my work has been like that – a personal response to a situation ... I can’t see being theoretical about an issue like that." On another occasion she explained that she had created this work "as a reaction against the idea of violence against women."Viso 2004, p.256, note 58.

Art writer

Megan Heuer Megan is a Welsh feminine given name, originally a diminutive form of Margaret. Margaret is from the Greek μαργαρίτης (''margarítēs''), Latin ''margarīta'', "pearl". Megan is one of the most popular Welsh-language names for women in W ...

describes the work as capturing the artist's interest in violence. Influenced by the work of the

Viennese Actionists Viennese Actionism was a short-lived art movement in the late 20th-century that spanned the 1960s into the 1970s. It is regarded as part of the independent efforts made during the 1960s to develop the issues of performance art, Fluxus, happening, ...

, ''Untitled (Rape Scene)'' also expresses Mendieta's desire to evoke a visceral reaction from her audience.

Bibliography

* *Szymanek, Angelique. "Bloody Pleasures: Ana Mendieta's Violent Tableaux," ''Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society'' 41, no. 4 (Summer 2016): 895–925. *Viso, Olga M. ''Ana Mendieta: Earth Body, Sculpture and Performance 1972–1985,'' exhibition catalogue, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC, 2004.

References

{{performance art Angelique Szymanek, "Bloody Pleasures: Ana Mendieta's Violent Tableaux," Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 41, no. 4 (Summer 2016): 895–925. Performance art 1973 works 1973 in art University of Iowa Feminist art Political art Collection of the Tate galleries Works about rape 1970s photographs Color photographs