Borderlines of labor : Margarita Cabrera’s sculptures and the (un)American dream

Abstract

This thesis contextualizes the work of artist Margarita Cabrera within Chicano, postcolonial, and feminist theories, and specifically places her work within discourses surrounding the United States-Mexico border. I address the evolution of Cabrera’s sculptural work from her initial Desert Plants to the collaborative, community-based workshop Space in Between, which prompted her incorporation of Florezca, a for-profit social enterprise. I discuss how Cabrera’s collaborative art-making process and founding of a corporation are strategic methods to challenge and attempt to change oppressive political systems in the United States that disenfranchise undocumented Latino immigrants.