Singer Lady Gaga will be honored for
her gay rights advocacy with a prize in memory of John Lennon.
Lady Gaga will share the biennial
LennonOno Grant for Peace with Russian punk band Pussy Riot, the late
peace activist Rachel Corrie, civil rights activist John Perkins, and
the late writer Christopher Hitchens.
Yoko Ono, the widow of Lennon, is
expected to present Lady Gaga with the award in Reykjavik, Iceland on
Tuesday, October 9 – the birthday of both John Lennon and his son,
singer Sean Lennon.
“Lady Gaga is one of the biggest
living artists of our time,” Ono said in a statement, adding that
“she is not only an artist, she is also an activist, using her art
to bring better communication to the world. She is being
acknowledged for her activism, and how her album Born This Way
has widely changed the mental map of the world. And how it has made
us deal with the future world, which happened to be here already.”
Lady Gaga will gift the award's prize
money to the Elton John AIDS Foundation.
(Related: Lady
Gaga: Pope Benedict's views on gay marriage don't matter.)