1973
1973
Ana Mendita was attending the University of Iowa in 1973 when Sarah Ann Ottens was raped and murdered in her dorm room. This event really struck the Iowa campus hard, especially Ana Mendita. This was a time when parents were unsure of whether to send their daughters to college campuses because of this exact event. Ana Mendita always put on a performance to complete her work. In this work, Mutilated body on Landscape, she showed the horrors what happens when a murder happens on campus. She covers herself in a white sheet as the coroners do when someone is murdered, but then she adds the visual weight of adding real blood over the top of the white sheet. Having real blood adds weight to the subject matter as it shows the realistic nature of the felony. This was one of multiple works by Ana Mendita that brought awareness to the issue of women's safety on college campuses.
