Archiva Chilena: Representation Practices and Feminist Visual Culture in Contemporary Art Institutions.

Abstract

During the realization of the “Polvo de Gallina Negra” exhibition (2022) at the Centro Nacional de Arte Contemporáneo (CNAC), the Archiva project - Masterpieces of Feminist Art in Chile, also known as Archiva Chilena, emerged. Proposed by the artist Mónica Mayer and curators Julia Antivilo and María Laura Rosa, Archiva Chilena documented 68 works by 57 Chilean artists, creating an archive of feminist “masterpieces”. The objective of this article is to reflect on the practices of representation and feminist visual culture that emerge from this archive, in order to understand how this action enhances the emergence of a Virtual Feminist Museum within CNAC. Through the analysis of Archiva, we will reflect on how it introduces new epistemic possibilities that challenge gender and power relations within art institutions.