What factors come into play when society characterizes a woman as desirable? Meléndez tackles subjectivity with sarcasm and wit in this large-scale self-portrait. Her body appears surrounded by dozens of red and pink lips and tongues that straddle a fine line between expressions of desire and repulsive, oversexualized gestures. The image encourages multiple interpretations: “With this image I denounce sexism. Women, with their censored bodies, and regardless of what they wear, they either provoke contempt, or desire, or violence. It is a representation that confronts women’s temptations as well as those of others, giant, perhaps a sarcastic nod to the myth of the hero. Women as a desired island, right at that moment before she is devoured.” 

 Gisela Carbonell, Curator Rollins Museum of Art