Public Art and the Grammars of Antiracism

Drawing on scholarship on the racial regime of mestizaje in Mexico and problematizing its implications in the production of public art in 21-century Mexico, this chapter examines a series of recent interventions in public spaces that we judge to fall, in different ways, under the criteria of “antiracist” artistic practices. The chapter discuss some tensions in the production of contemporary “antiracist” public art in Mexico, examining a variety of cases that encapsulate different approaches to visibilizing and contesting racist regimes. Focusing on art practices that resonate with “grammars of antiracism” (Moreno Figueroa and Wade 2022), the chapter analyzes artworks that mobilize explicit and implicit antiracist grammars. Overall, this chapter reflects on possible ways of envisioning public space as a political site for the enactment of social justice and the evolution of civil imagination. This leads the chapter to further interrogate the potential of antiracist art in public space for creating enduring effects that disrupt mestizaje logics and challenge hegemonic structures of oppression.