Rita Moreno has influenced the entertainment industry for over 70 years as an actress, singer, and dancer. After earning the four major entertainment awards: an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony, Moreno became the first Latina woman to have an “E.G.O.T.” In 2004, she was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her many contributions to the arts.
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen is the senior US Representative from Florida, the first Latina elected to the US Congress, and the first Republican in congress to publicly support the passage of the marriage equality act.
Identity has always been at the center of composer/pianist Gabriela Lena Frank’s music.
Forcing awareness and reassessments of historical and current socio-political issues in Cuba, her legacy comes not only from her work itself, but also the media coverage of her numerous arrests, incarcerations, and interrogations by Cuban authorities, who view her work as a threat to their political system.
Leonor Fini was befriended by the whole Parisian artistic community and was one of the most photographed people of the 20th century, resulting in the legacy of “queen of the Paris art world” (expression coined by art critic Sarah Kent). Her popularity in artistic social circles made her the subject of many poems, artworks, and photographs by various artists and writers of her time.
Eileen Agar helped to shape the development of Surrealism in Britain, a contribution made all the more impressive by the fact that she was one of only a few women associated with the movement. Her work continues to be exhibited in galleries all across the world, while the impact of her aesthetics can also be seen in the work of contemporary artists crafting their own versions of Surrealism.
By breaking down the barriers between art and life, Clark challenged received ideas about what art could or should be. Accordingly, she is a major reference point for contemporary artists dealing with the limits of conventional forms of art.
As an individualist who was disengaged from any official artistic movement, Kahlo’s artwork has been associated with Primitivism, Indigenism, Magic Realism, and Surrealism. Posthumously, Kahlo’s artwork has grown profoundly influential for feminist studies and postcolonial debates, while Kahlo has become an international cultural icon.
Izquierdo’s work opened up new possibilities for using symbols tied to Mexican traditions in a way other than to serve the nationalist discourse in art at the time. Izquierdo believed in art for art’s sake and wanted to go beyond the bounds of political art then. While the concept of art for art’s sake traced back to nineteenth-century European avant-gardes, in her context of post-revolutionary Mexico, this direction in art especially bucked the trend of using art as a propagandistic tool. Instead, art’s meaning, for Izquierdo, could be personal and variegated, not following the lines set by the politically powerful art establishment then.
Lorna Simpson’s interrogation of race and gender issues with a minimal, sophisticated interplay between art and language has made her a much respected and influential figure within the realms of visual culture.