"This book traces Ana Mendieta's (1948-85) development from the early performance-based works made as a student at the University of Iowa, where she was grounded in the conceptual and body-oriented practices of the 1960s and 1970s, to the creation of independent sculptures and objects in the early 1980s made with fragile, earthen materials. Rooted in nature and in the body, Mendieta's art was inflected by personal identity and femininity, and distinguished by its insistent hybridity. Her earth-body works, or Silueta Series (silhouette series), fused aspects of conceptual, process, performance, body, feminist, and land art. While contributing significantly to these varied dialogues, her work does not fit neatly within any of the accepted terms used to describe artistic activity in the decade." "Born in Havana, Cuba, Mendieta came to the United States as a twelve-year-old political refugee. Her personal and professional development was greatly informed by the painful experience of exile as well as the cross-fertilization of Caribbean and North American values. While deeply rooted in her personal experience, Mendieta's art reveals a passionate desire to connect with a wider, collective human heritage. Her aim to unravel layers of individual and social history and unmask latent ethnic, cultural, and gender biases in society, was to foster greater self-awareness and comprehension of the complex diversity of humanity. It is for this reason that her humble yet prolific production as an artist continues to be relevant today. Its meaning has particular resonance in a global society struggling to grasp the overwhelming points of correspondences and differences between individual, nation, and culture."--BOOK JACKET.