User:Kvasquez11/sandbox

Aguilar used visual art to bring forth marginalized identities, especially within the LA Queer scene and Latinx communities. Before the term Intersectionality was used commonly, Aguilar captured the largely invisible identities of large bodied, queer, working-class, brown people in the form of portraits. Often using her naked body as a subject, she used photography to empower herself and her inner struggles to reclaim her own identity as “Laura”- a lesbian, fat, disabled, and brown person.[1] Although work on Chicana/os is limited, Aguilar has become an essential figure in Chicano art history and is often regarded as an “early pioneer of intersectional feminism” for her outright and uncensored work.[2] Some of her most well-known works are Three Eagles Flying, The Plush Pony Series, and Nature Self Portraits.. Aguilar has been noted for her collaboration with cultural scholars such as Yvonne Yarbo-Berjano and receiving inspiration from other artists like Judy Dater. [3]

Subheading 1: _Nudes in Nature__________

Much of Aguilar’s work uses the nude female form being blended into different landscapes. Some of her most notable pieces such as Nature Self-Portraits, Grounded, and Center “fuse” female bodies into desert landscapes as “an integral part of [the] ecosystem”. [4][5] In 1996, Aguilar and fellow photographer, Delilah Montoya created the series of nudes in nature titled Nature Self-Portraits “on a road trip through New Mexico” where Aguilar found herself pushing the boundaries of her art. [6] Not only were the subject’s nude, but they were large-bodied and brown- bodies that art historians state “would have never been included in modernists photography”.[2] Subjects reflected the shape of rocks, trees, and water making their body a part of the land.[1] Through the “projection of her body”, Aguilar forces viewers to acknowledge her and rejects the “parameters of what is accepted as…normal, appealing”, and “attractive” [7][4]. By placing herself out front in nature, the viewer is asked to see her body for its beauty outside of conventional standards. [4] Scholars contend that Aguilar “challenges the idea of the female nude-one of the most important genres in western art” by using atypical bodies. [2] The desert, specifically the San Gabriel Valley, represented a homeland for Aguilar stating, “My mom grew up here…my grandmother grew up here, This was my playground”. [1] Aguilar’s self-acceptance in nature came from her sense of connection to the land. Curator Pilar Thompkins Rivas reflected on the relationship between Aguilar and the outdoors stating “feeling the sun on her body was important to her…because she did noy get a lot of touch in her life”.[8] This interaction between subject and landscape opens up different context and “new subjectivity” for Chicana/os to be represented in.[9]

Subheading 2: ___The Plush Pony Series_________ Aguilar turned the camera on herself after documenting the community she found herself in- the queer Latinx scene in East Los Angeles. It was the early 1990’s when Aguilar alone took black and white portraits at a “lesbian bar in the Los Angeles Neighborhood of El Sereno” called the Plush Pony.[10] The series was created in a “built in studio” in the bar showcasing a “range of butch/femme couples, gay men, gender-queer bodies, and combinations thereof” that made up the queer and immigrant community of Los Angeles.[10] Aguilar was an introvert and had a difficult time recruiting subjects stating, “I was nervous at first to talk to the women in the bar. They seemed tough”, but her camera helped her get over this and connect with the social scene.[10] Aguilar remarks that she “used [her] camera as way to approach people and as a way to get over my hesitation” resulting in lifelong friendships between herself and her subjects. [10] This work differed from the brown and queer photographic archive of the time because the relationship between artists and subject was blurred. Aguilar was not documenting marginalized people but was instead capturing the life of her community. From this perspective, Aguilar captures the varying compositions of “pleasure, community and friendship” though the lens of gender, race, sexuality, and class.[10] Like the Latina Lesbian series (1985-1991), the Plush Pony series became an expression and “living documentation of queer brown networks”.