Closing event for Contigo, Diana Solís on Friday, September 22nd from 6:30–8 PM: Join us for a conversation with artists Oscar Arriola, Samantha Friend Cabrera, Marylu Herrera, Colleen Keihm, Juan Molina Hernández, and Diana Solís, moderated by Deanna Ledezma.

Contigo, Diana Solís, co-curated by Nicole Marroquin and Deanna Ledezma, is a convening of photographs, artists, and communities. Rather than being structured as a “solo show,” Contigo: Diana Solís commemorates the social- and community-based dimensions of Solís’s photographic practice by bringing artists into creative dialogue. Born in Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexico in 1956, Diana Solís (they/them) has lived and worked in Chicago for over sixty years. This exhibition features Solís’s newly printed photographs, originating from film shot in the 1970s and 1980s, as well as their recently created digital photographs, made since their return to photography in 2020. These past and present photographs attest to Solís’s enduring commitment to documenting the people, places, and activities that form Latinx, LGBTQIA+, immigrant, and feminist communities in Pilsen and across Chicago. The recirculation of Solís’s archival photographs and revitalization of her practice today are intertwined, sustained by care, reciprocity, and labor. As the photographs in this exhibition underscore, portraiture is a strong source of this continuity. Whether their subject is a friend, acquaintance, or someone they just met, Solís’s honorific portraits exemplify their awareness of how photography, as a fundamentally social medium, asks us to behold each other.

The artists taking part in this exhibition reflect how Solís, as an educator, activist, and photographer, has long collaborated intergenerationally and continues to forge ever-expanding networks across generations in and beyond Chicago. The exhibition invites visitors to locate resonances among works by Solís and participating artists, while recognizing the specificities of their distinct social commitments, personal and collective histories, and sensibilities. In creative correspondence with Solís, these works act as points of intersection that help us understand art making as a practice done together, for our communities, and in response to others.

Including Works By:

Sandra Antongiorgi, Oscar Arriola, Samantha Friend Cabrera, Elle Muñoz Diaz, William Estrada, Maria Gaspar, Jackie Guataquira, Juan Molina Hernández, Sarita Hernández, Marylu E. Herrera, Colleen Keihm, Sam Kirk, Nicole Marroquin, Mony Nuñez, Sandra Oviedo, Clau Rocha, Vanessa Sanchez, CHema Skandal!, Akito Tsuda, and Nicholas Zepeda.

About the Artist

Diana Solís (b. 1956, Mexico) is a Chicago-based visual artist, photographer, and educator who has documented queer activism and Latinx daily life for almost five decades. They studied studio and experimental photography and worked as a photojournalist for twenty-five years, occasionally halted by recurring breast cancer. They have photographed poets including Sandra Cisneros, many consecutive years of Chicago and Mexico Pride marches, IV Encuentro Feminista de América Latina y el Caribe, early years at Latino Youth, marches and demonstrations, Chicago women’s rugby and women’s marathons, women’s bars, feminist gatherings, Chicano theater, and their neighborhood of Pilsen. They have been a teaching artist, painter, illustrator, and photographer for over forty years and currently reside in Pilsen. Solís is a 2023–24 recipient of the U.S. Latinx Art Forum (USLAF) Latinx Artist Fellowship.

http://dianasolis.com

Image info: Robert Ford, Cecilia “CC” Hunt, Trent Adkins (co-founder of Thing magazine with Ford), and Diana Solís after a
portrait session at Solís’s apartment and photo studio, above the Swan Club on North Clark Street, 1981.

Official Website

More events on this date

Tags: Akito Tsuda, Bridgeport, CHema Skandal!, Chicago, Clau Rocha, Co-prosperity, Colleen Keihm, Diana Solís, Diana Solís: Contigo, Elle Muñoz Diaz, Jackie Guataquira, Juan Molina Hernandez, Maria Gaspar, Marylu E. Herrera, Marylu Herrera, Mony Nuñez, Nicholas Zepeda, Nicole Marroquin, oscar arriola, Sam Kirk, Samantha Friend Cabrera, Sandra Antongiorgi, Sandra Oviedo, Sarita Hernandez, Vanessa Sanchez, William Estrada