Valeria Hidalgo Valencia

Women Within the Patriarchal Society

Valeria Hidalgo

My exhibition explores ideas about sexuality, violence, and sexual assault. My work reflects this through the female body as well as its focus on things that are generally associated with women. I decided upon this theme for two reasons. The first time was because of an activity in class. We were asked to define what art meant to each of us. For me art was whatever you want it to be; specifically, I view art as a way of expression, freedom, and rebellion. The second reason would be the increase in femicides and violence towards women in Mexico. I am originally from Mexico and I was raised exposed to both sides of the coin, one side coming from feminism and another from sexism. 

In both of my families, patriarchal ideas lingered disguised as encouragement. The first time I became aware of this was when I passed puberty since the conversations I had with my grandmother turned into a weird combination of praise and shame. They shifted from how proud she was of me for being a smart and educated woman to conversations about how I needed to be 18 or more to ask my father for permission to have sex and I needed to get married to a man that would provide for me. However, from my mother’s side, this was never the case. My grandmother was very traditional but never cared about that type of thing. She taught me that marrying a man with money had to be my last priority and that what I really needed to do was be completely independent and always pursue what made me happy regardless of what society told me I could and could not do. 

This is when I truly realized how much sexism affects the way in which women are treated. Sexist and patriarchal ideals are not preserved by men only, but also by women who teach them to their children. After this, I became very interested in the way in which my culture as a whole carried these values. A lot of things gave it away, from how men expected their wives, daughters, and girlfriends to dress, to the way in which men do not help clean the table but rather stay put and talk while they watch the women in their family clean. Nevertheless, there is one value that exposes sexism more than the others, the idea that women belong to men and they are an object that exists to fulfill their necessities of any kind, a value that is reflected in the statistics of femicides— where 922 women were killed in the year 2021 (LA Times, N.D)— and rape — where 19,484 women were raped in 2021 (LA Times, N.D)— in Mexico.   

One femicide in specific drove me to the decision to make this the focus of the exhibition. Her name was Daniela and she was murdered by her boyfriend in her apartment; the boyfriend was arrested and remained in jail until he was taken out by his country’s consulate. This resonated with me because Daniela was the younger sister of my mom’s co-worker. After this happened and I saw the way that something like this could impact a family, I decided that I wanted my exhibition to be more than something aesthetic to look at. I wanted to create pieces that reflected how much things like sexual assault can impact an individual. I want my exhibition to create awareness and reflect the hazards that patriarchal ideals cause. This idea of discomfort— inspired by Leonor Fini’s idea of shocking the audience— is what drove me to make pieces that would have conceptual meanings as well as literal ones. My culture is reflected in pieces where specific cultural facets are displayed such as important monuments and the feminist song for Mexico. The pieces do not follow a particular order, they are made to stand for themselves except for the last piece which displays a dead woman with the feminist song in the background. This piece shows the resilience of feminist women to bring awareness and their lack of fear. My exhibition aims to condemn different aspects of patriarchal and sexist ideals in hopes to create awareness of the problem they create.