1. Visual Studies
Coordinator: Dr. Mario Mendez Ramirez.
Technology has made producing imagery easier and cheaper than ever before. Cell phones are used to capture
situations that would have been inaccessible just a few years ago. Video cameras in stores, buildings, ATM machines
and streets continuously observe and record ephemeral events. But this overproduction of images has restricted ranges
of circulation. Many of the recordings are never reviewed or published. Even images that are published on the Internet
are only seen by a few.
The mass circulation of predominantly visual messages, some of which reach global audiences, is strategically centralized.
The groups that control the mass media and publishing continue to filter content. The cultural, social, political and
economic consequences of this centralization demand the participation of various disciplines in conjunction
with the field of visual studies. This interdisciplinary character makes it difficult for university
institutions to design programs that address the different approaches, as well as their productivity
and purposes.
In short, visual studies is a plural and complex undertaking that includes the elements
and formal structures of images, the social and anthropological implications of
the act of seeing and being seen, the study of the processes of domination and
the exercise of power through visual representations, the construction of identities
and subjectivities that are objectified in visual-cultural production, as well as
the economic effects of the unequal exchange of the production and circulation
of images.
This work group will discuss this diversity of proposals in a manner that is
more exploratory than conclusive and open avenues of research that will
allow future researchers to contribute to the necessary processes of renewal
of our institutions.
Drawing in Postmodernism
Janitzio Alatriste T.
The Vanishing Object of the Object: Mysticism in Artistry
Edgar Leal
Nomadism in the Production of Visual Arts and the Need for Wounds: Reflections on the New Ontological Contexts of Contemporary Art — Liberation and Displacement
M.A. Rocío Cárdenas Pacheco
Publication in the Expanded Field
Eduardo Ramírez Pedrajo
Visual Studies as an Input in the Production of Projects: from the Conceptual Map to Artistic Research
M.A. Rodolfo Rojas-Rocha
Possible Files
Dr. Teresa Bordons
About Dr. Mario Mendez Ramírez
Mendez Ramírez is a visual arts technician with a specialization in painting (Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, 1982). He has a bachelor’s degree in Communication Sciences (Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, 1986), a master’s degree in Arts with a major in Cultural Promotion (Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, 1999) and a doctorate in Arts (Universidad de Barcelona, 2004). He is also certified in Research Techniques (Universidad de Colima, 1998).
He leads the Academic Body of the Visual Arts Department of the Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, where he teaches Visual Arts as part of the bachelor’s program as well as the master’s programs for Art Education and Cultural Promotion.