Dr Sofia Gotti is an art historian and curator specializing in modern and contemporary art in South America. Her work broadly focuses on the intersections of radical politics, art, and popular culture, to consider how patriarchal, colonial and racial orders can be destabilised or diffused. Sofia is currently working on a large-scale grant application focused on Art and Populism. Her first monograph “Pop Countercultures” is under contract with Liverpool University Press.
In 2024 she was part of the curatorial team of Stranieri Ovunque – Foreigners Everywhere, the 60th International Art Exhibition at La Biennale di Venezia. The same year, she curated the XX Biennale Donna in Ferrara titled Yours in Solidarity. Previously, she worked on numerous exhibitions at institutions including the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museums, Castello di Rivoli Museo d’Arte Contemporanea, FM-Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea, The Americas Society, and commercial galleries internationally.
Sofia studied Curating at Central Saint Martins and History of Art here at the Courtauld. She completed a collaborative PhD studentship between Chelsea College of Art and Tate linked to the 2015 exhibition The World Goes Pop (Tate Modern, 2015). She held a Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship and an associate Lectureship at the University of Cambridge’s History of Art Department and Centre of Latin American Studies. She also taught at Milan’s Nuova Accademia delle Belle Arti (NABA).
Teaching
- MA Curating, core module, ‘The Practice of Curating’
- MA Curating, elective module, ‘Working with Artists’
- MA History of Art, Critical Debates: ‘Archival Bodies’
Upcoming and recent publications
Monograph
Pop Counterculture: Pop Art, Radicalism and Sexual Politics in Argentina Under Military Rule (under contract with Liverpool University Press)
This book situates the work of Pop artists in Argentina within dissident counterculture, across the sixties and seventies. While often perceived as a-political or vaudeville, artists working in tension with the language of consumerism and the mass media, advanced their political causes from sexual liberation to gender equality and civil rights.
Articles
- ‘“Modern Art, Indigeneity and Nationalism in Paraguay: An introduction to Josefina Plá’s ‘Ñandutí: Crossroads of Two Worlds,’” ARTMargins (accepted for publication, forthcoming).
- “Equally Present Temporalities: Craft and The Contemporary at The Museo del Barro, Paraguay,” The Journal of Modern Craft (guest editors Claire Jones and Imogen Hart), Dec 2022.
- “Worldviews: indigenous artists, informants and the rhetoric of decolonisation in Paraguay,” Burlington Contemporary, June 202,1 Issue 4: Art from Latin America.
- ‘Popau, Pop or an “American way of living?” An introduction to “From Stamps to Bubbles, by Aracy A. Amaral,’ in ARTMargins, (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, Vol. 5, Issue 2, 2016).
- ‘A Pantagruelian Pop: Teresinha Soares’s “Erotic Art of Contestation,”’ Tate Papers, no.24, Autumn 2015. Reprinted in: Adriano Pedrosa, Camila Bechelany and Rodrigo Moura (eds.), Quem Tem Medo de Teresinha Soares?, São Paulo: MASP, 2017.
Book chapters
- “Sofia Gotti and Marko Ilic, “Points of Origin: From a History of Alternative Art to a History of Alternative Institutions,” in Meredith A. Brown and Michelle Fischer (eds.), Collaboration and its (Dis)Contents Art, Architecture, and Photography since 1950, (London: Courtauld Books Online, 2017).
- “An Index of Modernity: Feminist Furniture by Teresa Burga and Beatriz González,” in Flavia Frigeri and Kristian Handberg (eds.), Multiple Modernisms – New Histories of Art in the Global Postwar Era, London: Routledge, March 2021.
- “The Art vs. Politics Conundrum: The Case of Carla Accardi and Carla Lonzi, 1963-1973,” in Andrea Giunta, Dorota Biczel, Fabiana Lopes, et al. (eds.), Seminário Internacional Bienal 12, 12ª Bienal do Mercosul, 2020, pp. 183-190.
- “A State of Alert: Eroticism as Political Activism in South American Drawing,” in Kelly Chorpering et. al. (eds.), The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Contemporary Drawing, London: Wiley Blackwell Publishing, 2021.
Exhibition Catalogues
- “Banderas de lucha: The Insurgent Textiles of Claudia Alarcón & Silät,” in Adriano Pedrosa and Laura Cosendey (eds.), Claudia Alarcon and Silät, São Paulo: MASP, 2026 (forthcoming).
- “Ofelia Rodríguez: Beyond the Fantastic,” in Carmen Juliá (ed.), Ofelia Rodríguez : Talking in Dreams, Bristol: Spike Island, 2024.
- “Behind the Scenes of Tomie Ohtake’s Abstraction: Collage, Marginality and Eros,” in Paulo Miyada (ed.), Tomie Ohtake Dançante, São Paulo: Instituto Tomie Ohtake, 2022.
- “Between Craft and Sculpture: Carla Accardi, Giuseppe Civitelli and Nedda Guidi,” in Giuseppe Civitelli, Milan: Montrasio, 2023.
- “Mondo: Towards New Ecologies of Knowledge,” in Pietro Scammacca and Claudio Gulli (eds.), Lachea, Catania: Istituto Sicilia, 2021.
- “Contextualising Irma Blank’s Aesthetic of Silence,” in Irma Blank, New York: Luxembourg & Dayan, 2019.
- Dadamaino: A Full Time Struggle, New York: Mendes Wood DM, 2018.
- Sergio Lombardo: Gesti Tipici and Monochromes, London: Sprovieri, 2017.
- “Waltercio Caldas: An Introduction,” in Waltercio Caldas, London: Cecilia Brunson Projects, 2017.
- Artist Biographies, in Flavia Frigeri and Jessica Morgan (eds.), The EY Exhibition: The World Goes Pop, London: Tate Publishing, 2015.
Writing for a wider public
- “Eroticism, humour and Graves: A conversation with Teresinha Soares,” paradoxa, Vol. 36 London: KT Press, July 2015.
- “Mobilizing Memory: Rebel Archives, Logbook of an Exhibition,” Nero Editions, 12 July 2021,
- “Learning from Art when Coping with a Pandemic: Yuli Yamagata’s use of Softness,” Madrazine, #7, March 2020.
- “How to Deal with Dystopia: ‘The Missing Planet’ at Pecci Centre, Prato”, Mousse Magazine, March 2020.
- “Sensible Ecstasy in the works of Mandy El-Sayegh,” Flash Art International Online, May 2019.
- “Il bilinguismo radicale di Anna Maria Maiolino,” Flash Art Italia Online, 22 May 2019.
- “Oli Bonzanigo,” Flash Art Italia, n 340, July/September 2018
- “Willys de Castro: From Paintings to Objects 1950-1965,” Arte Al Día, n. 152, 2017.
Exhibition reviews
- “Turning Nation into Nature: Renato Leotta,” Nero Editions Online, September 2020.
- “Between Archaeology and Space Exploration: Human agency and ideologies related to progress, buckling in the face of overwhelming natural forces in the work of Juliana Cerqueira Leite,” Nero Editions, Milan, February 2020.
- “Il Soggetto Imprevisto. 1978 Arte e Femminismo in Italia FM Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea / Milano,” Flash Art Italia, #344, pp. 150-151.
- “Reviews: Global Art and Latin America. Tarsila do Amaral: Inventing Modern Art in Brazil.” Revista Hispánica Moderna, Volume 72, Number 2, December 2019, pp. 229-232.
Exhibitions
Stranieri Ovunque – Foreigners Everywhere, the 60th International Art Exhibition (curatorial team)
La Biennale di Venezia, Apr-Nov 2024
Yours in Solidarity, XX Biennale Donna (co-curator)
Palazzo Bonacossi, Ferrara, Apr-Jun 2024
Conversation Piece (curator)
Italian Embassy in London, Oct 2023
Clemen Parrocchetti: Handmade Militancy (co-curator)
Chert Luedde, Berlin, Apr-Aug 2023
In Full Crisis: Frontiers of Italian Art (curator)
Italian Embassy in London, Oct 2022
Claudia Casarino: Microrrelatos del cuidar y la posibilidad del error / Microtales of care (curator)
Galeria Fuga y Mora, Asunción, May-Jul 2022
Rebel Archives: Anna Bella Geiger, Mirella Bentivoglio, Nedda Guidi, Rosana Paulino, Clemen Parrocchetti (curator)
Villa Era, Biella, May-Jun 2021
Ñandutí: Indigenous and Modern Artworks of Paraguay (curator)
Preview.art, online, Dec 2020 – Jan 2021
Università Sconosciuta @ Fondazione Giangiacomo Feltrinelli, Milan, Sep 2019 – Feb 2020
Co-founder of public programming initiative hosted by Fondazione Feltrinelli, Milan. Guests including artists Joseph Kosuth, Anna Maria Maiolino, Joana Escovall.
Visions of Brazil: Reimagining Brazilian Modernity from Tarsila to Sonia (curator)
Blum&Poe, New York, Apr – Jun 2019
The Unexpected Subject: 1978 Art and Feminism in Italy (researcher)
FM Centre for Contemporary Art, Milan, Apr – May 2019
Claudio Tozzi (curator)
Houssein Jarouche Gallery, São Paulo, Apr – Jul 2018
The Feminist Institute, Public Programming (curator)
Various Locations, NYC, Mar 2017 – Feb 2018
Guests including Donna Haraway, Sheryl Sandberg and others.
Dadamaino (curator)
Mendes Wood DM, New York, Feb – Apr 2018
Leonilson: Empty Man (researcher)
AS/COA, New York, Jun – Sep 2017