The Witch

The processes of liberation of speech born out of the #MeToo movement, accompanied by the communication power of social media, has opened up spaces for reflection and discussion on a global level, unparalleled in history. These spaces analyze and identify, with increasing acuity and precision, the mechanisms of perpetuating the constraints and ancestral oppressions that women face.

In her video installation "La Bruja" (The Witch), Tanya Mordacci approaches an uncommon questioning within current feminist movements, where critical stances among women are unlikely or quickly turn into sororicidal wars. She explores the victimization of women as a mechanism of domination and power, the use of complaint as a tool of manipulation, and the instrumentalization of femininity as weakness. In a format resembling a short film, filled with references and cinematic images (Werner Herzog, David Lynch), Tanya Mordacci redefines the significance of the witch character. She presents the witch not as a denial of femininity or as a manipulative and malicious being, but as an entity in the process of liberating herself from the Judeo-Christian ancestral constraints that confine women to predefined notions of what they can and should be.

Using the moment of birth/death as an analogy for this liberation, we enter this video installation to bear witness to the struggle it entails – the breaking of familial lineages, female archetypes, and the creative possibilities that this liberation generates.

Ximena Alarcón
February 2022