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How did Diamela Eltit's 1980 performance address poverty, prostitution, and social abuse?
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Latin American art
Detail from Popular History of Mexico, mosaic mural by Diego Rivera, 1953; on the Teatro des los Insurgentes, Mexico City.
In her 1980 performance, Chilean artist Diamela Eltit addressed the intersections of poverty and social abuse by performing in a brothel, where she inflicted cuts and bruises upon herself.1
By projecting a video of this self-abuse onto the wall opposite the brothel while simultaneously washing the sidewalk outside, Eltit created a powerful commentary on the exploitation inherent in the sex trade. Her actions served as an allusion to the extreme measures individuals may accept to escape poverty, while the act of cleaning the sidewalk symbolized a broader, urgent need to cleanse the moral stains of a corrupt society.1