Grow the Matriarchy (2026)
Institutional pricing (libraries, universities, for use on tv/movies etc) . Please contact us for invoicing or a custom listing:: $360
Melanie Cervantes
14" x 17", 10 layer handmade screen-print (five metallic layers)
Canson Bristol smooth cold-pressed watercolor paper, 100 lb (260 gsm), acid-free
Printed in Emeryville, CA (October) 2026
Edition of 75 with Dignidad Rebelde's studio symbol as a dry embossed seal in left hand corner
Patriarchy is not inevitable. It is a system of power that has been imposed, maintained, and reinforced through centuries of colonialism, violence, and exploitation. It has shaped how we relate to one another, to the land, and to the world around us. But it has not succeeded in erasing the knowledge of our ancestors or the ways of living that existed before these systems were imposed.
Grow the Matriarchy is rooted in the understanding that another way of living is possible. Across generations, Indigenous women have carried knowledge, sustained communities, defended land, and organized resistance in the face of tremendous violence. Their leadership has been essential to our survival, yet their contributions are too often overlooked or erased, even within movements working toward liberation.
Our ancestral cultures also hold understandings of gender that extend beyond the rigid binaries imposed through colonization. While these understandings differ across Indigenous peoples and traditions, they remind us that the ways we understand gender today are not the only ways our peoples have lived. Colonialism sought not only to take our lands and exploit our labor but also to control our bodies, regulate our relationships, and impose patriarchal ideas about gender and sexuality. Reclaiming ancestral knowledge means making space for the gender expansiveness that has always been part of our histories. Our resistance to patriarchy must also challenge the gender binaries and hierarchies that continue to marginalize women, queer, trans, and gender-expansive people.
When I think about growing the matriarchy, I am thinking about what it means to reclaim the knowledge and practices that colonialism has tried to destroy while also creating something new. It is not about replacing men with women in positions of power or creating another hierarchy rooted in gender. It is about transforming our understanding of power itself. What would our communities look like if care, reciprocity, accountability, and collective well-being guided how we lived? What could we build if we honored the leadership and knowledge of women and gender-expansive people as essential to our collective future?
In this image, a elder/abuelita holds a bowl of fire. The flame represents what has been passed down to us through generations: knowledge, resistance, and the determination to survive. It also represents what we have a responsibility to carry forward. The fire is not something we are waiting to discover. It is already here, in our communities, in the struggles we inherit, and in the ways we care for one another.
The words "may the fires of matriarchy burn bright and illuminate your path" are an offering of encouragement to those working to create a different world. They are also a reminder that the future we want will not simply emerge on its own. We have to make it possible through our actions, our relationships, and the choices we make about how we live together.
Growing the matriarchy is both an act of remembering and an act of imagining. We carry forward what our ancestors protected while making room for what future generations have yet to create. Our liberation requires that we make room for all of us.
--------
PERSONALIZED CARD: If you would like to include a personalized card please include the message you would like included (30 words or less) in the "Notes or Instructions" section at checkout. If not message is included in this section we will include a card with a handwritten inspirational quote of our choosing.
--
International Packages: Please contact us for a quote on the exact price of shipping to your address. Outside of the U.S shipping.: Tracking Included, Insurance optional.
