What the censorship of performance artist Xandra Ibarra means for Latinx artists fighting for free expression

Performing as her alter-ego La Chica Boom, the El Paso-born and Oakland-based artist, Xandra Ibarra creates racialised and sexualised parodic performances about queer Chicana identity. This week, one such work, Spictacle II: La Tortillera (2014), was removed by city officials from the group exhibition XicanX: New Visions at Centro de Artes in San Antonio, Texas, on account of “obscene content”. In the video performance, Ibarra plays a minstrel Mexican housewife, stripping down to nipple tassels, fishnets, and a strap-on which holds a bottle of Tapatio hot sauce in place of a dildo. In the final scene, she masturbates and ejaculates the hot sauce onto tacos made with tortillas and panties.

The National Coalition Against Censorship has called the removal of the video a violation of First Amendment rights, and artists, including Karen Finley of the NEA Four (a group of four artists who were denied funding from the National Endowment for the Arts on account of the subject matter of their work in 1990), have expressed support for Ibarra. A letter signed by scholars from institutions such as Brown University, Princeton University, and the University of Texas at Austin, was presented to a sub-committee meeting of the San Antonio Arts Commission. Though that sub-committee offered unanimous support for reinstating Ibarra’s work, more meetings are planned before a final decision will be made by the Director of the Department of Arts and Culture. Currently, the  curators continue to gather public support via a Change.org petition. 

SLEEK spoke with Ibarra’s and the curators of the exhibition, Suzy González and Michael Menchaca, about the censorship being faced by Latinx artists in Texas, and the ramifications of this case for free expression in the USA.

What was the curatorial focus of the exhibition and the impetus behind including Xandra Ibarra’s work?

Michael Menchaca: Our exhibition took an inclusive approach toward curating work from Latinx artists, with a focus on the “x” factor within the community, which has been left out of previous surveys. We wanted to highlight the work of Afro-Latinx artists, indigenous artists,  and also the LGBTQ+ community. Xandra is one of the more critically acclaimed artists in the show. We wanted to bring her perspective and recognise the cultural value of her work.

Suzy González: [Xandra’s] representation of queer femme sexuality was a big part of why we included her. We thought San Antonio needs to see this. Without Xandra’s work in this exhibition, the topic is being missed in the larger conversation we are trying to have about the legacy of the Chicano Art Movement and where that leaves us now in 2020.

As artists, have you previously experienced censorship of your work?

Xandra Ibarra I have been asked to put a curtain over my work, to place my work in a peep box, to exchange works for something less sexual, and I am almost always asked to have a sign that warns the public of nudity and explicit content. I have also been told that I rely too heavily on my race, sex and sexuality to make work. Yes, I do. I make work that brings me joy and I enjoy threatening the grip that prescriptive nationalist discourses and their signifiers have on me.

MM:  In 2015, I was asked to participate in a group exhibition, RESYMBOL at The Plaza De Armas. The piece, a digital animation titled Aspersionem, was installed with a Styrofoam frame attached to the flat screen monitor on which it was displayed. The piece featured a cat representing mestizaje identity, squatting and urinating on a floor in a bar room setting. I was asked by staff to remove the content of the animation and replace it with another animation. The justification for the city’s decision at that time was that the Plaza De Armas was “not an art gallery” but a “city owned gallery”. I agreed to their request and replaced the animation with Composite Digital Codex: Education and Work. I didn’t realise at the time that my rights were being infringed upon. 

I was invited by a curatorial collective Bridge Projects (Stuart Allen & Cade Bradshaw), to contribute artwork for a show entitled LIFT, focusing on kites in contemporary art. I proposed to build a kiosk for a kite object to be displayed in. The Unite the Right rally occurred in Charlottesville, VA, making national news shortly before the start of the exhibition. I decided to address the issue directly with my kite object and kiosk in response to the alt-right’s hateful motivations, which led to the death of activist Heather Heyer at the rally. I titled my piece, Go Fly a Kite, submitted, delivered, and installed my work on location at Artpace. I was asked by curator Stuart Allen, days before the show’s opening, to voluntarily censor my vision for the piece by removing the kiosk object entirely to which I refused. After several attempts by Allen to censor portions of my piece, or exhibit it as detached from the exhibition, I decided to pull out from the show.

What has been the reaction to Ibarra’s’s censorship in the San Antonio community?

MM: Xandra has a lot of support in San Antonio. Although she has not previously exhibited here, the people of San Antonio are asking for her work here because of our desire for expressions of queer sexuality.

SGThe city is 63% Latino. We have a great number of people of colour and a great queer community, which is often affiliated with the arts. The people making big decisions in government don’t reflect our community in many ways. A lot of the community came out to show support, and artists have thanked us, saying that this is going to help them in their career express themselves more freely.

How are Latinx artists in San Antonio and Texas being impacted by censorship?

MM: The San Antonio based artist Ashley Mireles contributed a screenprint to a print portfolio entitled Los Tejanos, organised by Wendi Valladeres and J. Leigh Garcia. The print portfolio was on view at the Cedar Valley College Art department in which Mireles’ screenprint featured a “Whites only” sign from the Jim Crow era. The print was removed from the exhibition and given to the gallery coordinator without notifying neither the artist nor the curators. The gallery coordinator did not reinstall the artwork and an investigation was opened to determine why. This censorship happened while the dean of the art department was on paternity leave. Upon returning, he instructed that the print be reinstalled immediately and the exhibition time was extended. 

Mark Anthony Martinez also had artwork removed from Mexic-Arte [due to concerns that its text reading “white power” could be misinterpreted].

SG: In San Antonio, there is a pattern of censorship against the work of Latinx artists, who are just making their work as they see fit. If someone doesn’t want to see a work of art, you have choice: you just don’t see it. It’s not like we’re forcing people to see something they don’t want to see. 

What are the ramifications of Ibarra’s’s case for other artists?

SG: As artists of colours, we are often stepped on. There’s a concept that art and culture precede policy and law, so what we’re seeing here is a continuation of the culture war. [Fighting this censorship] is setting a precedent—we are worthy, our work is worthy, and we should be able to freely express ourselves without people putting limitations on us. It’s unfortunate that our presidency and our city government is not ready for us to express ourselves as stated in the constitution, but the arts community is more than ready to just be ourselves.

XI: I don’t think of this as activism or community organising per se. I am standing up for my art and defending myself against this censorship, not in my role as an organiser, but as an artist. It is productive for me to stand by my work. 

You can sign the Change.org petition here.