17 Facts About Laura Aguilar

Laura Aguilar was born with auditory dyslexia and attributed her start in photography to her brother, who showed her how to develop in dark rooms.

Laura Aguilar was mostly self-taught, although she took some photography courses at East Los Angeles College, where her second solo exhibition, Laura Aguilar: Show and Tell, was held.

Laura Aguilar has been noted for her collaboration with cultural scholars such as Yvonne Yarbo-Berjano and receiving inspiration from other artists like Judy Dater.

Laura Aguilar was well known for her portraits, mostly of herself, and focused upon people in marginalized communities, including LGBT and Latino subjects, self-love, and social stigma of obesity.

Laura Aguilar's mother is of mixed Mexican and Irish heritage.

Laura Aguilar had auditory dyslexia and developed an early interest in photography as a medium.

Laura Aguilar was active as a photographer beginning in the 1980s.

Laura Aguilar was mainly self-taught, although she studied for a time at East Los Angeles Community College and participated in The Friends of Photography Workshop and Santa Fe Photographic Workshop.

Laura Aguilar's works have appeared in more than 50 national and international exhibitions, including the 1993 Venice Biennial, Italy; the Los Angeles City Hall Bridge Gallery, the Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, the Los Angeles Photography Center, the Women's Center Gallery at the University of California in Santa Barbara, and Artpace's exhibit Visibilities: Intrepid Women of Artpace.

Laura Aguilar was a 2000 recipient of an Anonymous Was A Woman Award and the James D Phelan Award in photography in 1995.

Laura Aguilar died of complications from diabetes in a Long Beach, California nursing home, Colonial Care Center, at the age of 58.

Nudes and Self Portraits Much of Laura Aguilar's work is self-portraiture in the nude, these series include Stillness, Window, Motion, Grounded, Center and Nature Self-Portraits.

Much of Laura Aguilar's work uses the nude female form being blended into different landscapes.

At the center, Laura Aguilar is bound by ropes with the Mexican flag wrapped around her head and the American flag wrapped around her hips.

Laura Aguilar set up in the East Los Angeles lesbian bar called The Plush Pony and took photographs of the patrons creating a series of black and white portraits of the lower working class community.

Laura Aguilar turned the camera on herself after documenting the community she found herself in- the queer Latinx scene in East Los Angeles.

Laura Aguilar was not documenting marginalized people but was instead capturing the life of her community.