Paula Martíns, 07.06.2023 

Dissident Fantasies; Chile – Mexico (1978-1987) comes to Madrid to showcase the work of three of the most renowned female photographers in history and to show us a magnificent visual journey on gender resistance in Latin America.

To say that PHotoEspaña always brings the best of photography to our country is nothing new, but that every year it exceeds expectations is nothing new either. On this occasion, within its 2023 program, the Memoria gallery (19 Piamonte St., Madrid), headed by Alejandro de Villota, is one of the galleries in charge of delighting us with a new exhibition that focuses its attention, literally, on gender activism in Latin America.

Dissident Fantasies; Chile – Mexico (1978-1987) lands in the capital under the lens of three of the most renowned photographers in contemporary history: Yolanda Andrade, Paz Errazuriz and Graciela Iturbide. Accompanied by the illustrations of activist and vedette Terry Holiday, the exhibition looks back to the 1970s and 1980s to show us an ancestral and anthropological perspective of gender identity in Latin America. It is a magnificent story that traces the work of these four masters of the image and that narrates and explores the path of the construction of gender, taking the countries of Mexico and Chile as a backdrop.

In this recently released exhibition and, through different portraits, all its participants draw a visual scenario that presents the resistance against the normativity of the system. It does so under a contemporary and very powerful gaze that highlights the artistic activism of the moment.