Ana Mendieta Traces

During her short career, Ana Mendieta (1948-1985) created a body of work that was provocative and radically inventive. Using her own body, together with elemental materials - blood, fire, earth and water - she created visceral performances and ritual ephemeral 'earth-body' sculptures exploring life, death, rebirth and spiritual transformation.Born in Cuba but sent to America as a child, much of her art expresses the pain and rupture of cultural displacement and exile. Her images are compelling, mysterious and poetic. In some, the outline of her body is consumed by gunpowder, fireworks, or advancing waves; others record ancient goddess-forms moulded from sand, carved into rock, or incised in clay.This book includes an anthology of never seen before material including Mendieta's own writings and press coverage of her shows. Encompassing a wealth of her drawings, photography and filmography, it also provides a compre­hensive and enlightening perspective on this important artist's work.This title accompanies the first monograph exhibition of this artist in the UK at Hayward Gallery, 24 September - 15 December 2013.