Men and Landscapes for an Act of Violence

Landscapes for the Attempt (2021–2024) and Stone Men (2020–2024) are two photographic series created simultaneously by the artist, which form part of the project Men and Landscapes for an Act of Violence. In this photographic essay, the artist reflects on mental health among men and on the gender-based violence occurring in the public space in Mexico City. Linking these two case studies allows her to discuss male chauvinism as a deeply rooted cultural practice in Mexican society, which is manifested publicly through different types of violence against women and girls and privately through emotional self-isolation by individuals with suicidal tendencies. Against this backdrop, the artist draws on everyday life as the raw material for her research, a stance that may be understood as inherited from feminist thought, where the personal is political and life itself lies at the heart of artistic reflection. Like a flâneur, she builds her identity, interests and concerns around the city.

 

Stone Men is the artist's response to the sexual harassment experienced by women in the streets of her city, while Landscapes for the Attempt is her way of addressing mental vulnerability among certain types of men. By connecting the two themes, Serrano ponders whether the lewd, violent aspect of the male gaze and behavior could be driven by a gender education that denies men the affective dimension of life. Serrano's work could be said to explore a psychogeography of masculinity. She uses photography and drawing as tools for empowerment in the context of an inept Mexican government and a widespread disinterest among civil society.

 

This allows the artist to convey the idea that her personal experiences are part of a profoundly structural problem. In turn, she shows that male chauvinism forms a complex symbolic framework in which the stories of aggressors reveal other factors relevant to understanding violence as a cultural phenomenon. Perhaps hypermasculinity is ultimately a social construction that is being suffocated by the very same noose it uses to oppress others.

 

Artist presented by Campo, Mexico City, Mexico

 

 

Denis Serrano is a Designer and Visual Communicator with an orientation in photography from the Faculty of Arts and Design, UNAM (Mexico). For about eight years, she has worked on artistic proposals that involve the use of photography as the main form of expression, exploring topics such as gender violence and mental/emotional health. She has exhibited her projects in museums, institutions, independent spaces, galleries and festivals in Mexico, Uruguay, Spain, the United Kingdom, Estonia, South Korea, Hong Kong SAR, Cambodia and the United States. She is co-founder of Bulbo A.C., an organization dedicated to the dissemination and research of artistic projects around the image.

 

Born 1991 in Mexico City, Mexico.
Lives and works in Mexico City, Mexico.

 

An independent curator, his research reflects on the relationship between memory and desire. He is curator of Centro de la Imagen (Mexico) from 2018 to 2021. Among his main projects are Pirates on the Boulevard. Agustín Martínez Castro (Centro de la Imagen, 2018), The Ballad of Sexual Dependency. Nan Goldin (Centro de la Imagen, 2019), Bewitched Clothing (Outsiderland, Amsterdam, 2022) and Positive Negative. Cultural Reactions against AIDS in Mexico (Centro de la Imagen, 2022). In 2019, he founds the Contemporary Images Platform for Centro de la Imagen, a website dedicated to promoting new talents in Mexican photography. He is director of Drama, an independent space dedicated to Mexican queer photography.