Lysistrata.

Reading of Aristophanes' anti-war comedy 'Lysistrata, ' directed in Mexico City by Jesusa Rodríguez and performed by an array of renown artistic and intellectual figures of current Mexican cultural sphere. This event is celebrated in the context of the Lysistrata Project ('The First-Ever Worldwide Theatrical Act Of Dissent') through which on Monday, March 3rd, 2003 (03/03/03), fifty-nine countries hosted 1,029 readings 'to protest the Bush Administration's unilateral war on Iraq' (www.lysistrataproject.com). After the reading, a public forum was celebrated, making an open call to join pacifist/activist efforts to come up with proposals for the denunciation of 'Mexico's national war': the political issue of the murders in Ciudad Juárez. Also, a call was made to boycott American products for two months as a way of protesting the war on Iraq, while demanding, as citizens, a firm repudiation of the war by Mexican President Vicente Fox. Mexican director, actress, playwright, performance artist, scenographer, entrepreneur, and social activist Jesusa Rodríguez has been called the most important woman of Mexico. Often referred to as a 'chameleon, ' Rodríguez moves seemingly effortlessly and with vigor across the spectrum of cultural forms, styles, and tones. Her 'espectáculos' (as both spectacles and shows) challenge traditional classification, crossing with ease generic boundaries: from elite to popular to mass, from Greek tragedy to cabaret, from pre-Columbian indigenous to opera, from revue, sketch and 'carpa, ' to performative acts within political projects. Humor, satire, linguistic play, and the body are constants in her productions. She seeks to render corporal and, thus, visible, the tensions between the discourses in operation on and through the individual and collective body. Rodriguez's energy is intense and her commitment non-negotiable, always interrogating the nature, site, and consequences of power and its representation. Liliana Felipe, one of Latin America's foremost singers and composers, was born in Argentina in the 1950s. She left for Mexico just before the outbreak of the 'Dirty War' (1976), but her sister and brother-in-law were both 'disappeared'--victims of the military dictatorship's criminal politics. Liliana's music has a wide following in Latin America. She continues to be a powerful presence in Argentina, working with human rights organizations--especially H.I.J.O.S. (the organization of the children of the disappeared). In Mexico, Liliana went to one of Jesusa Rodríguez's performances. Jesusa, catching a glimpse of Felipe in the audience, remembers saying to herself: 'I am going to die with that woman.' Since then, Liliana and Jesusa have created two performance spaces, El Cuervo and later El Hábito in Coyoacán, Mexico City, that they still run. They 'married' in February 2000. El Hábito (www.elhabito.com.mx) is a hotbed for intellectuals, feminists, gay rights activists and open-minded, progressive people who want to be engaged by a smart and critical humor. In this off-off space, and with the collaboration of their theater cooperative Las Divas, Jesusa y Liliana have produced hundreds of shows since the 1980s. Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics