Karla Desentis Rodriguez
The first part of this project, entitled Latente, is a six-minute video collage in landscape format, depicting twenty close-up frames of women's hands. They are writing without ink on a white piece of paper, leaving invisible marks. Each frame portrays an individual story through unique hand movements, drawings, tools, sounds and spaces. The sounds produced by pencils, pens and other drawing instruments creates a crescendo of sonic textures.
Through the use of diverse video frames, materials and actions, I invite the audience to reflect on forms of violence against women and its impact. I'm attempting to show the invisible violence that women live with all around the globe. The final footage includes videos of people from Brazil, Canada, China, Finland, France and Mexico. The languages used are English, Spanish and French.
“Worldwide, almost one third of women who have been in a relationship have experienced physical and/or sexual violence by their intimate partner and 7% of women have been sexually assaulted by someone other than a partner... violence against women is pervasive globally. The findings send a powerful message that violence against women is not a small problem that only occurs in some pockets of society, but rather is a global public health problem of epidemic proportions, requiring urgent action.” (WHO, 2013)2
In my research around this topic, I've found that physical assault is more emphasized, while psychological violence like sexism and misogyny are mostly ignored. This is why I'm interested in exploring the universal objectification of women, which leads to other forms of aggression and violence, and the lack of visibility and understanding of this problem on a global scale.
With COVID-19 we understand more than ever what it is to have a problem of epidemic proportions, but, do we get this regarding violence against women?
(b. Mexico City 1985, based in Vancouver, Canada)
Karla Desentis is a dancer, choreographer, designer, and musical theatre actress. One of her strongest interest is to develop herself as an interdisciplinary artist, integrating dance and design in art interventions, performances, video-dance, dance theatre and physical theatre. Whiling to do artistic work with a genuine sense of purpose; taking into account the problems of the contemporary world.
She began her career in the performing arts at the age of five and concluded her studies as a dancer after 13 years of training in classical, contemporary, jazz and folklore technique, endorsed by the Mexico City Ballet Academy. Her increasing interest in arts led her to study the career of Industrial Design at the National Autonomous University of México, focusing on set design and costumes, along with the diploma in Musical Theater at CECAAP. After finishing her studies in design, she did a Bachelor's Degree in Choreography at the National Fine Arts Institute (INBA).
In the professional field, Karla has been in numerous dance productions as a dancer, as well as a director of her own choreographic work. As a teacher she has worked for over ten years, recently she has been teaching an interdisciplinary (dance and design) workshop for the Faculty of Arts and Design at UNAM.
Her work has been a creditor of awards such as the Academic Merit Diploma by The Architecture Faculty of the UNAM in 2010 and the Honorable Mention in Excellence by the National Institute of Fine Arts in 2015. Within artistic residency programs, she has been benefited from the INBA Foundation for the summer program of the School of Toronto Dance Theater in 2012 and by The Banff Center for the Arts in Alberta, Canada, for the Indigenous Dance Residency program in 2016.
Currently, she is studying an M.F.A. (Master of Fine Arts) in Interdisciplinary Arts at SFU School of Contemporary Arts.
