‘Disobedient Spaces’: Wallach exhibition highlights Lotty Rosenfeld’s legacy of resistance

The Lenfest Center’s latest exhibition features the work of Chilean artist and activist Lotty Rosenfeld, examining public space, censorship, and political life under dictatorship. “Disobedient Spaces” is on view through March 15 at the Miriam & Ira D. Wallach Art Gallery.

Photo by Saanya Anand/The Barnard Bulletin

By Saanya Anand

March 14, 2026

Located just west of 125th Street and Broadway in Manhattanville, the Lenfest Center for the Arts is Columbia’s hub for the visual and performing arts and home to the Miriam & Ira D. Wallach Art Gallery. Known for presenting contemporary exhibitions that engage social and political themes, the space provides a fitting setting for “Lotty Rosenfeld: Disobedient Spaces,” which highlighted the work of Chilean artist and activist Lotty Rosenfeld and challenged viewers to reconsider ideas of power and authority. 

Recognized by The New York Times as a “must-see gallery show,” the exhibition immediately established a confrontational and politically charged tone. As visitors stepped off the elevator, they encountered a black-and-white photograph of Rosenfeld carefully placing tape across a dashed road line to turn it into a cross — a defiant gesture taken from her street intervention, “A Mile of Crosses,” where Rosenfeld disrupts the visual order of the street and questions the authority that governs public space by altering a simple street marking. Positioned against a striking red wall, the image drew attention to the simplicity and deliberateness of the act, with a single strip of tape challenging a system of power and authority, and framed the exhibition as a space of critique and questioning rather than neutral storytelling. 

Rosenfeld was a key figure in Chile’s experimental art scene during the 1970s and 1980s, when General Augusto Pinochet’s military dictatorship (1973-1990) enforced strict censorship and repression. These conditions deeply shaped her practice, leading her to use public space, video, and performance as subtle yet powerful forms of resistance. Rosenfeld’s work spans multiple mediums, demonstrated throughout the exhibition. Old box-style televisions sat beside modern monitors, while a projector displayed slides taken from her original U-matic color videos. The exhibition also heavily featured her photography work. These pieces largely document her public interventions, including images from “Ay Sudamérica!,” performances staged in urban spaces, protest actions under the Pinochet dictatorship, and close-ups of ordinary citizens occupying public streets. The coexistence of outdated and contemporary technologies in her pieces underscores the longevity of her work, which spans from 1970 to 2007, including later printmaking from 2007.

Each section of the exhibition was devoted to a different political urgency — whether it was feminist representation, marginalization, poverty, or hunger. Audio from multiple video installations overlapped, such as recordings of protests, chanting, and a woman singing, creating a layered soundscape that set an urgent and somber mood. It felt like several focused exhibitions gathered under one title, unified by a shared commitment to resistance.

Rosenfeld was known for her experimental use of video, often projecting moving images onto buildings and public spaces. Working in a climate where public expression was heavily monitored, she used projection and performance as a vehicle of intervention. The exhibition featured “Moción de orden” (“Point of Order”), in which she projects marching ants onto a wall as part of a larger audiovisual project, drawing parallels between the ants’ rigid division of labor and social hierarchy and our own systems of control. Another striking work that commanded attention was the color film “¿Quién viene con Nelson Torres?” (“Who Comes with Nelson Torres,” 2001), which examines whose voices are granted legitimacy within the public sphere. Through its focus on public dialogue and controlled access to speech, the film exposes how authority determines which individuals are heard, believed, or dismissed — a dynamic deeply rooted in the censorship practices of the Pinochet era. 

The exhibition also foregrounded Rosenfeld’s collaborations with Chilean writer Diamela Eltit. Book covers designed by Rosenfeld were displayed alongside documentary photographs from their work with Colectivo de Acciones de Arte (CADA), the artist collective that staged public interventions under the Pinochet dictatorship. These interventions often took place in streets and everyday urban spaces, directly challenging the regime’s control over public expression and reclaiming visibility for ordinary citizens.

“Disobedient Spaces” ultimately lived up to its title. It documented Chile under dictatorship, detailing the cruelty endured by citizens while simultaneously demonstrating how ordinary spaces can become forms of resistance. Rosenfeld transformed streets, screens, and buildings into sites of dissent, clearly exhibiting how resistance can emerge even within the most tightly controlled environments by small but visible acts of defiance. This exhibition urged viewers not only to acknowledge the injustices embedded in public life but also to find ways to speak up against them, even within the limitations imposed by the systems of power.