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Sara Chao on Laura Aguilar

“Her persistance and resilience as an artist made me feel like there was hope for me.”

LAURA AGUILAR, a self-taught photographer emerging from the lesbian Chicana community of the late 20th Century, challenged Western concepts of beauty and nudes in art. Her work with her own body as elemental as the rock formations she visited with her grandmother as a child opened eyes and minds to the natural beauty of all human shapes. Young artist Sara Chao is wildly inspired by Laura's work and life -- both native-born Angelenos seen as "other" in their own hometown.

Storyteller

Sara Chao

SARA CHAO is an installation artist who is invested in interactive art, viewer participation, and collaboration. A Los Angeles native, her work draws from the need to memorize the objects and visuals of daily life in LA. She is a Los Angeles native and third-generation American.

Featured Woman

Laura Aguilar

Laura Aguilar was a self-taught photographer. She was also dyslexic, queer, Chicana, and a gal in a large body. Her grandmother was a rock collector who exposed Laura to the great rock formations that would influence Laura’s art. Commissioned for a mental health conference, Laura created a photo-journal “Latina Lesbians,” to demonstrate warmth, friendship and jabs at the typical assumptions made about this community. Her self portraits are poignant, witty challenges to our cultural identies and stereotypical ideas of beauty. She poked our psyches and our prejudices. Laura Aquilar’s art has given us all another shot in the arm at how we look at art.