Tate Photography: Laura Aguilar

This Tate Photography book showcases works from different photographic series that made Laura Aguilar one of the most influential artists of her generation. It also includes one of her previously unpublished artist statements.

‘Women taking ownership of their bodies and allowing forgiveness of self as a form of healing is one of the ways in which I have approached my work. It is as much a formal experiment as it is a societal gift.’

Laura Aguilar (1959–2018) was a trailblazing Chicana artist and photographer, best known for her images that explore ideas of beauty and the female form in relation to nature and place. In the 1980s and 1990s, she experimented with portraiture and text to give visibility to a range of perspectives from Latinx and LGBTQ communities around Los Angeles. She later began using her naked body as a subject, adopting photography as a medium to empower herself and find her place among diverse interests and intersecting identities. Her images have been increasingly exhibited and praised since a major retrospective in the United States launched in 2017.

The Tate Photography series is a celebration of international and British photography in the Tate collection and an introduction to some of the most significant photographers at work today. Each book focuses on an individual photographer and features a specially selected sequence of photographs, an introduction by a Tate curator, and a conversation with the photographer. These collaborations between artists and experts enrich our understanding of photography and its connection to everyday life, and move from city streets to seashores, across landscapes and subcultures, through identities and interiors, in a visual travelogue of our world today.

The theme for Series Three is Queer and Visible, bringing together four artists who use photography to unfold valuable insights into queer life. Each artist uniquely reflects upon societal constructs of sexuality and race and responds to the experience of living in a predominantly white and heteronormative Western society. Desire, identity and joy are artfully explored, upturning assumptions about blackness, race and queerness.

To see and to be seen, representation in good faith, artful storytelling, resonant images. These are the perspectives and qualities we seek from photography. The artist-photographer notices and captures, shows us pattern and meaning, emotion and connection, expanding the possible, making hearts and minds capacious.

• Dimensions 20 x 14 cm
• Material FSC certified paper
• Paperback Yes
• No of pages 64