Hernández's work has been exhibited both nationally and internationally since 1973. Her work is included in the permanent collections of the National Museum of American Art, the Smithsonian Institution, the Library of Congress, the Museum of Modern Art and the Mexican Museum in San Francisco, the Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum in Chicago, and the Frida Kahlo Studio Museum in Mexico City. In 1988 her first major solo exhibition, titled "The Defiant Eye", was held at Galería de la Raza in San Francisco. Since that time her work has appeared in such exhibitions as "Day of the Dead" (Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum, Chicago, 1989), "Meeting of the Madonnas" (Ethnographic Museum, Warsaw, Poland, 1991), "Mostra América" (Museu da Gravura, Curitiba, Brazil, 1992), "The Art of Provocation: Ester Hernández, A Retrospect" (University of California, Davis, 1995), "Transformations: The Art of Ester Hernández" (MACLA Center for Latino Arts, San Jose, CA, 1998) and "Ester Hernández: Everyday Passions" (Galería de la Raza, 2001), as well as touring exhibitions including "Chicano Art: Resistance and Affirmation" (CARA) (1990–93), "Ceremony of Spirit" (1994–96), "Chicano Expressions" (1994–96), "The Role of Paper" (1998-2001), "Chicano" (2002–03), and "One Heart, One World" (2002). She has received awards and commissions from organizations ranging from the California Arts Council to the National Endowment for the Arts.