Ana Mendieta: Death, Art, and Legacy
The Controversy and Death of Ana Mendieta
Initial Protest and Unanswered Questions (1992):
During the inaugural show at the Guggenheim Museum's new SoHo gallery in 1992, approximately 500 feminist protesters formed a picket line outside.
They carried banners asking, "Where Is Ana Mendieta?", accusing the male-dominated art establishment of forgetting the artist, who had died seven years prior.
The inclusion of work by her former partner, minimalist sculptor Carl Andre, in the exhibition further incensed protesters, Mendieta's family, and friends.
Many believed Andre was responsible for her death.
The Incident (September 8, 1985):
In the early hours of September 8, 1985, Ana Mendieta fell 34 floors from an apartment window on Mercer Street in Manhattan.
Carl Andre, her partner, called emergency services, stating Mendieta "somehow gone out the window."
Both had been drinking heavily.
Carl Andre's Account and Skepticism:
Andre claimed to remember nothing of the events leading up to her death and suggested she might have committed suicide.
Friends of Mendieta found suicide highly unlikely due to her acute fear of heights and her positive state of mind and career momentum.
Artist Ted Victoria, a close friend, dismissed the idea of her jumping, especially "in her underwear," emphasizing her success and lack of depression.
Victoria speculated her death occurred during a fight, given her hatred of heights and the window's proximity to their bed.
Artist Dotty Attie, a friend from the AIR gallery, noted that "most people thought he had done something active," while Andre's women friends supported him, leading to significant division in the New York art world.
Police Investigation and Trial:
Police found their bedroom in disarray and Andre with scratch marks on his nose and arms.
Andre's initial statements to the police contradicted his recorded message to emergency services.
He was arrested and charged with murder.
A doorman testified to hearing a woman scream "No" multiple times around 5:30 am, followed by the sound of her body hitting the roof of a delicatessen below.
After three separate indictments, Andre was acquitted due to insufficient evidence to prove he had pushed her.
Lingering Doubts and Criticisms of the Trial:
Many of Mendieta's friends remain unconvinced of Andre's innocence, citing contradictions in his police interviews and his decision to be tried by a judge rather than a jury (which prevented cross-examination by the prosecution).
Feminist writer and academic B Ruby Rich criticized the "cynical way" Andre's lawyers used Mendieta's art to support the suicide theory, a move she claimed was "colluded in" by "many powerful figures in the New York art world."
The Art and Legacy of Ana Mendieta
Reappraisal and Pioneering Status:
Previously largely unknown outside feminist art criticism, Mendieta's work has undergone a significant reappraisal.
Recent major exhibitions at the Whitney Museum (New York) and an imminent retrospective at the Hayward Gallery (London) highlight her as a pioneering artist.
Ralph Rugoff, Hayward's artistic director, notes her work "ranged nomadically across practices associated with body art, land art, performance, sculpture, photography and film."
"Earth-Body" Art and Themes:
Mendieta described her Cubin-born and American-raised work as "earth-body" art.
From her first solo show in 1971 (as an MA student at the University of Iowa) until her death, she created diverse pieces.
Silhouettes: Images of her body made in mud, earth, rocks, wildflowers, and leaves.
Performance Pieces: Evoked folk and occult traditions of Cuba and Mexico; explored themes of female sexuality and the horror of male sexual violence, sometimes using blood "as a very, powerful magical thing."
Subversive Self-Portraits: Played with notions of beauty, belonging, and gender, including pressing her face against glass to distort features, dripping in blood, or disguised as a man with glued-on facial hair.
Influence of Exile and Personal Qualities:
Her art and spirit were fueled by a restlessness rooted in her exile from Cuba.
Friends described her as "sparky," "provocative," "tempestuous," "outspoken," and "fiercely ambitious."
After her death, some saw foreshadowing in her often dark and ritualistic art (e.g., a performance showing her prone under a blood-splattered white sheet).
Others claimed her as a "freest of female free spirits" in a male-dominated art world.
Curator and scholar Irit Rogoff noted that Mendieta was "essentialised through an association of wild appetites and with unbounded female sexuality."
The power of her art is now taking precedence over these stereotypes and the dramatic manner of her death.
Ana Mendieta's Early Life and Exile
Birth and Family Background:
Born in November 1948 in Cuba, the second of three children to Ignacio and Raquel Mendieta, an affluent upper-middle-class couple.
Father's Political Involvement and Family's Escape:
Her father, initially a Fidel Castro supporter, became an assistant in the post-revolutionary ministry of state in 1959. However, he grew disillusioned with the anti-Catholicism of the new Cuba and engaged in counter-revolutionary activities.
Ana (12) and her sister Raquelin (14) also participated in these activities.
In 1961, fearing for their safety, their father arranged their passage to America through Operation Pedro Pan, a scheme organized by a Miami priest that allowed around 14,000 children to emigrate to the US under Catholic Church guardianship.
Traumatic Early Years in the U.S.:
Ana's initial euphoria ("kissed the ground") was short-lived.
She and Raquelin were placed in an Iowa reform school where beatings and confinement were common.
Subsequently, they were separated and moved between several foster homes for years.
Ana felt abandoned by her family and isolated from her homeland.
She didn't see her mother and brother again until 1966 and her father (jailed for disloyalty to Castro) until 1979. He died shortly after arriving in America.
Impact of Exile:
Ted Victoria stated, "You have to understand she came to America with nothing."
This "sense of exile" fostered a "fierce independence of spirit" and a "survivor's spirit."
The transition from the "heat and fire of Cuba to puritan Iowa" left a profound mark.
Her driven nature, feistiness, and combativeness were attributed to these experiences, alongside her generosity.
Artistic Development and Influences
University of Iowa and Hans Breder:
Mendieta began making art at the University of Iowa.
She had a decade-long affair with artist and academic Hans Breder, who was her most important formative influence.
Breder introduced her to cross-disciplinary practice, referencing Marcel Duchamp, Yves Klein, and the Viennese actionists.
He also organized visits from avant-garde artists like Hans Haacke and Vito Acconci.
Mexican Influence and "Siluetas" Series:
In the summer of 1971, Mendieta traveled to Mexico for research, perceiving it as "like going back to the source, being able to get some magic just by being there."
This trip solidified her vision of a unified art of the self, drawing on nature, place, performance, and sculpture.
Her earliest visceral performances in 1973 were a response to the rape and murder of a university student, Sara Ann Otten.
By 1974, she used blood as a primary material in works like "Body Tracks," where she smeared blood down a wall.
All her work was meticulously documented through film or photographs, often by Breder.
In summer 1975, she created the first of her "Siluetas" series in Mexico, leaving imprints of her body in the ground.
These silhouette pieces became her signature, executed using stones, leaves, twigs, flowers, and driftwood, sometimes set on fire, outlined by fireworks, or drenched in red paint.
Artistic Philosophy and Feminist Connections:
In an artist's statement from the early 1980s, she wrote: "My art is grounded on the belief in one universal energy which runs though everything, from insect to man, from man to spectre, from spectre to plant, from plant to galaxy."
B Ruby Rich asserts Mendieta's art is deeply rooted in the feminism of the time, as much as in Cuban traditions.
In the 1970s, blood was reclaimed as a feminine and feminist material in art.
Rich highlights the potency of Mendieta's early earthworks, especially those made in Mexico, because they were created by a woman.
She differentiates Mendieta's work from male earth artists like Robert Smithson or Richard Long, arguing that a woman's engagement with the earth makes a distinct statement.
Mendieta used her body as her art, placing it in the ground to "ground herself in the earth" and "reconnect with the earth that she was standing on even if it was not Cuba."
Relationship with Carl Andre
Arrival in New York and Feminist Art Circle:
Mendieta moved to New York in 1978, settling in an apartment on Sullivan Street.
She befriended leading feminist artists such as Nancy Spero, Mary Beth Edelson, and Carolee Schneemann.
She joined the all-women AIR gallery on Wooster Street in 1979, supported by Edelson.
Dotty Attie, a founding member of AIR, noted their collective goal was "everything that men had in the art world," primarily "recognition."
Their Contrasting Personalities and Attraction:
Mendieta met Carl Andre through Nancy Spero.
Their relationship intrigued some and baffled others due to their stark differences: she was feisty, opinionated, small, and sexy; he was cold, detached, towering, and intellectually aloof.
Argentinian artist Liliana Porter observed that their different personalities were their attraction.
Andre was methodical and routine-driven, while Mendieta was his opposite. He admired her strong personality, looks, and intensity.
Mendieta, in turn, enjoyed his company and, to some extent, "needed a more mature and steady point of reference."
Artistic Divergence and Professional Rivalry:
Their art practices were creatively distant: hers was wide-ranging, elemental, and ritualistic; his was minimalist, refined, and cerebral (Andre is known for his 120 bricks arrangement at the Tate).
Ironically, Mendieta's career was ascending while Andre's demand and prices were declining during this period.
When drunk, Mendieta would taunt Andre about this, saying things like, "You know, Carl, minimalism is over… you already did your thing." He would retort in kind.
Drinking Habits and Arguments:
Friends, like Ted Victoria, noted their heavy drinking, often arriving at dinners with "four or five bottles of champagne."
Arguments were common, often initiated by Mendieta when drunk, as she could be "combative" and had "loads of attitude."
Dotty Attie recalled a drunken dinner in Rome where Mendieta pointedly remarked, "Oh, he likes your work, but he's never bought anything."
Despite the arguments, Attie did not get the feeling Andre was violent, recalling his self-control even when heavily intoxicated (e.g., refusing to let Mendieta drive).
Marriage and Suspicions:
In 1983, Mendieta moved to Rome on a prestigious American Academy residency, falling in love with the city and feeling more accepted there than in America.
Her relationship with Andre temporarily soured, but they reconciled and married in a private ceremony in Rome in January 1985, surprising acquaintances.
Upon her return to New York in August 1985, she confided in friends that she suspected Andre was having an affair in Berlin, where he had been working intermittently.
The Final Days and Reappraisal
Final Events:
On Thursday, September 5, 1985, the couple had dinner with Nancy Spero and her husband, painter Leon Golub, who described them as "happy and relaxed."
Three nights later, they stayed in for a Chinese takeaway, a movie, and champagne.
The following day, Mendieta was found dead on the roof of a delicatessen, 33 floors below an open window of their apartment. Her body hit the surface with such force that her head left an imprint.
Death's Echo in Art and Untapped Potential:
"Even her death echoed her art," referencing her works involving body imprints and blood.
B Ruby Rich stated, "Ana was on her way somewhere else creatively when she was killed," indicating she was transitioning to making objects rather than ephemeral works, which she could sell. She was reportedly excited and optimistic.
Attie recalled Mendieta in Rome earlier that year, planning to quit drinking and smoking because "women artists did not get recognition until they were old" and she "wanted to live long enough to savour it."
Exhibition Highlight:
The article mentions the exhibition "Ana Mendieta: Traces" at the Hayward Gallery, London.