Marcel Alcalá: Gallo Gallina

Marcel Alcalá received their BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. They have held solo exhibitions at Night Gallery, Mickey Gallery, and Deli Gallery and exhibited in numerous institutions, including the Tom of Finland Foundation (where they were artist-in-residence) and MCA Chicago. Their work was recently featured in Made in L.A. 2023: Acts of Living, Hammer Museum and Moved–Displaced, Orange County Center for Contemporary Art. Alcalá is also a performer and writer. Assuming a derisive alter ego named Payasa (the feminine form of the Spanish word for clown), their performance work often tackles topics that feel otherwise taboo—specifically, the artist’s thoughts about race and gender politics and their personal experiences with these constructs.

Dr. Ksenia M. Soboleva is a New York based art historian specializing in queer art and culture. She holds a Ph.D. from the Institute of Fine Arts, NYU, with a dissertation on art, AIDS, and lesbian identity in the United States. Soboleva is currently working on a book project titled Friendship as a Way of Art: Queer Identity and Visual Citation, and co-editing (with Svetlana Kitto) the first major publication on the lesbian gallery Trial Balloon. Her writings have appeared in the Brooklyn Rail, BOMB Magazine, Hyperallergic, Ursula Magazine, as well as various exhibition catalogues and artist monographs. She teaches at the New School and NYU.