(1888PressRelease)
May 14, 2009 - The Cintas Foundation will present the 2009 Cintas Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award in the Visual Arts (Posthumously) to Ana Mendieta. Her sister, Raquelin Mendieta, will receive the award in her honor. The award will be presented at a ceremony at the Frost Art Museum of Florida International University on May 20, 2009, at 7:00 pm. The public is invited.
Ana Mendieta (Nov. 18, 1948 – Sept. 8, 1985) is recognized for her pioneering work in performance-based art and land art. In a prolific career that spanned only 13 years (1972 to 1985), Mendieta created a powerful and compelling body of work that has had a lasting legacy and inspired subsequent generations of artists around the world, including artists working inside Cuba. Today, Mendieta is considered a key figure in the histories of contemporary Cuban, Latin American and feminist art as well as in the development of performance-based art and land art.
As a Cuban exile, who left her homeland in 1961 at age 12 following Castro’s revolution, Mendieta made films, photographs and sculptures rooted not only in conceptual art and in performance but also in her own passionate search for origins. She received her education in Iowa in the 1960s and moved to New York in the late 1970s. She evolved a singular approach to art making she called “earth body art,” based on her own body, or its haunting silhouette, which she integrated with the land in myriad variations.
She sought to blur boundaries between media and disciplines in her art and fused elements from Cuban history and culture with cultural references from around the globe. Her work sought the commonalities between cultures and peoples, rather than the differences. Throughout her career, Mendieta embraced her identity as well as her own hybridity as a bicultural person, yet she resisted all forms of boundaries and limiting stereotypes that culture often imposes on individuals. In this way Mendieta has served as an important touchstone to artists all over the world who navigate issues of identity.
Mendieta died tragically in 1985 at age 36 as her career was gaining momentum and she was receiving increased notoriety. The Cintas Board is immensely pleased to recognize the important contributions of this singular artist to the art of our time.
“The Board felt that it is very important for the Cintas Foundation to recognize the pioneering work of the late performance-based artist Ana Mendieta”, said Hortensia E. Sampedro, president of the Cintas Foundation.
The Cintas Foundation was established with funds from the estate of the late Oscar B. Cintas (b. Sagua La Grande, Cuba 1887 – d. La Habana, 1957), a prominent industrialist and patron of the arts. Since 1963, the Cintas Foundation has awarded more than 300 fellowships to artists of Cuban lineage who reside outside of Cuba.
About The Cintas Foundation
The Cintas Foundation was established with funds from the estate of the late Oscar B. Cintas (b. Sagua La Grande, Cuba 1887 – d. La Habana, 1957), a prominent industrialist and patron of the arts. Since 1963, the Cintas Foundation has awarded more than 300 fellowships to artists of Cuban lineage who reside outside of Cuba.
About the Frost Art Museum - Florida International University
The Frost is an AAM accredited museum and Smithsonian affiliate. The museum is located at 10975 SW 17thSt. across from the Blue garage and adjacent to the Wertheim Performing Arts Center on the University Park campus. Its hours of operation are Tuesday through Saturday 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. and Sunday noon-5 p.m. The Frost is closed on Mondays and most legal holidays. For more information, please visit www.frostartmuseum.org or call 305-348-2890.
###
