The Visiting Artists Program resource guides contain upcoming speakers' biographies, articles, video and audio content, related publications in the Flaxman Library, and additional online resources. These guides may be used in the classroom in preparation for the event, research, or post-lecture discussion.
Edra Soto: Tuesday, February 18, 6:00–7:30 p.m.
The Art Institute of Chicago, Fullerton Hall, 111 S. Michigan Ave.
This event will be live captioned by Communication Access Realtime Translation services.
Join us for a lecture by artist Edra Soto followed by an audience Q&A.
Edra Soto (MFA 2000) is a Puerto Rican-born artist, educator, and co-director of the outdoor project space The Franklin. Soto instigates meaningful, relevant, and often difficult conversations surrounding socioeconomic and cultural oppression, erasure of history, and loss of cultural knowledge. Having grown up in Puerto Rico, and now immersed in her Chicago community, the artist has evolved to raise questions through her work about constructed social orders, diasporic identity, and the legacy of colonialism.
Soto has presented recent solo exhibitions at Comfort Station, Chicago (2024); Maine College of Art & Design (2024); Morgan Lehman Gallery, New York (2024); Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago (2023); Institute of Contemporary Art, San Diego (2023); Abrons Art Center, New York (2021); Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (2018); Headlands Center for the Arts, Sausalito, California (2017), and The Arts Club of Chicago (2017). Her work has been featured in notable recent group exhibitions including Widening the Lens: Photography, Ecology, and the Contemporary Landscape, Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh (2024); Entre Horizontes, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (2023); no existe un mundo poshuracán, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2022); and Estamos Bien, La Trienal 20/21, El Museo del Barrio, New York (2021).
She has been awarded the Joyce Award; 3Arts Next Level Award; Illinois Arts Council Fellowship; Joan Mitchell Fellowship; Bemis Center’s Ree Kaneko Award; US LatinX Art Forum Fellowship; and MacArthur Foundation International Connections Fund. Soto has received numerous public commissions: Public Art Fund at the Doris C. Freedman Plaza, Central Park, New York (2024); Noor Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (2024); Now + There, Central Wharf Park, Boston (2023); the Chicago Architecture Biennial (2023); Terminal 5 at O'Hare International Airport (2023); Chicago Botanic Garden (2022); and Millenium Park in Chicago (2019). Her work is in the collection of institutions including the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Pérez Art Museum Miami; Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico; and Museum of Contemporary Art of Chicago.
Presented in partnership with SAIC Alumni Engagement
Photo Credit: Edra Soto. Courtesy of Public Art Fund. Photo: Liz Ligon
Edra Soto On Puerto Rican Art, Public Sculpture and Her New NYC Installation ‘Graft’
Dan Duray | Observer | November 2, 2024
HOW ART CHANGED ARTIST EDRA SOTO
All Arts Staff | All Arts | October 9, 2024
Edra Soto: ‘This kind of architecture lives in the background’
Wallace Ludel | The Art Newspaper | September 5, 2024
New Three-Year Arts Series Will Center NYC’s Latine Community
Maya Pontone | Hyperallergic | August 28, 2024
Central Park State of Mind: Edra Soto Puts the Home in Public Art
Charles Venkatesh Young | New City Art | August 26, 2024
Everybody’s home
Coco Picard | Chicago Reader | August 27, 2024
Edra Soto: Hyde Park Art Center
Susan Snodgrass | Artforum | October 2023
With Her Decade-Long Exploration of Puerto Rico’s Architectural Motifs, Edra Soto Highlights Their Cultural Value
Maximilíano Durón | Artnews | April 15, 2023
Edra Soto: Casas-Islas | Houses-Islands at Morgan Lehman Gallery, NYC (Review)
Sebastián Meltz-Collazo | Arte Fuse | April 16, 2021
Edra Soto with Robert R. Shane
Robert R. Shane | The Brooklyn Rail | April 2021
Edra Soto
Scott Indrisek | Foundwork | no date
Edra Soto: Graft
Edra Soto (b. 1971, Puerto Rico) explores the relationship between our private, interior lives and shared public history and culture. Graft is the latest in an ongoing series of installations. On view September 5, 2024–August 24, 2025.
Edra Soto: lazos terrenales / earthly bonds
In lazos terrenales / earthly bonds, Edra Soto employs the patterns and materials found in Puerto Rican architecture to examine colonial histories, diasporic identities, and constructed social orders. Previously on view July 12–September 15, 2024.
EDRA SOTO: DESTINATION/EL DESTINO: A DECADE OF GRAFT
Destination/El Destino: A Decade of GRAFT offers a mid-project survey of the GRAFT series to date by artist Edra Soto. Previously on view April 22–August 6, 2023.
Edra Soto: The Myth of Closure/El Mito del Cierre
The Myth of Closure | El Mito del Cierre is a deeply personal body of work exploring loss, the now complicated associations of home, and figurative closure. Previously on view December 10, 2022–March 5, 2023.
Visiting Artists Program Lecture Recordings from the Archive
SAIC Visiting Artists Program video and audio lecture recordings (1977–present.) Available with SAIC login credentials.
SAIC Digital Collections: Visiting Artists Program
SAIC Visiting Artists Program publicity archive and audio recordings (1977–98).
