Perez, Note to Reader, Intro, & Chapter 1

I read the note to the reader, introduction, and chapter 1 of Perez's book, Chicana Art. Honestly, I find Perez to be often time hard to read because of all the jargon she uses, but it is interesting to see where she is coming from and what she is influenced by. She says that she began to explore post-1965 spiritual literature, which allowed her to begin her approach to these "religiously-unorthodox and, in many cases, non-Western- identified readings" (2) and takes from them a "gesture of yearning and ofrenda, or offering, to ward greater personal integrity, empowerment, and social justice" (2). A sort of gift to fellow Chicanas. She puts a heavy emphasis on the spiritual and sees it as an integral piece of Chicana art, expression, and way of life. Chicana artists not only found spirituality in their art, but also found expressions of social injustice of their indigenous pasts (although not in the "Chicano masculinist nostalgia for a romanticized but dead past" (4)), and also found inspiration from the home altars of their grandmothers. They expressed the emptiness of exploited religions and the "ritual-like performance that exposed expectations of Indigenous as stereotyped and static" (5). essentially, they were changing the face of modern Chicana art and the way people viewed it. Chicana art is not only heavily influenced by the "patriarchal ethos of ... Mexican American" (9) culture, but also by the mainstream American world. It is a response to all of these influences and a rebuttal to the stereotypical and wattered-down approach to Chicana art.

In chapter one, Perez deals with the spiritual, and the notions circulating about the spiritual. The inspiration created by the spiritual, coming from mostly "Mesoamerican, other American Indian, African diasporic, and feminist critiques of traditional religiosities" (18). she says that speaking of the spiritual in relation to the cultural practices of the disempowered (for example, women) is provocative and loaded with dangerous ambition. racist thinking and the linking of women of color with the spiritual is what makes it a difficult topic.