Pivot Arts Festival 2026 – The Exhibition(s)
Pivot Arts has always been a home for performance — but the work that moves us isn’t bound to a stage. This year, we’re deepening our commitment to multidisciplinary art, investing in mediums that live alongside our theater and dance projects rather than within them. After the joy and success of last year’s muralist residency, we’re thrilled to welcome visual and installation work back into the festival.
Kayla Reefer and Mikee Parangalan anchor that expansion. Reefer’s photographic reckoning with Afro-Panamanian lineage and Parangalan’s tender performance-installation on abundance ask their questions in image, object, and space — proof that the boldest new work in Chicago doesn’t always arrive in a single form.
Traces...
an exploration of lineage, identity, and memory. Identity specifically has been the focal point of my art practice and career for the past eight years. To me it translates as a mirror, as a core tenant to who we are as individuals. In my personal work, I explore identity through family. The make up of who I am is informed by those who came before me and within that genetic composition are things we carry generationally, what we pass down, and what we choose to no longer hold. At its essence, Identidad is a photographic study and personal journey that examines the intricacies of my familial Afro-Panamanian heritage and identity. In broader form, the nexus of the project is to redefine narratives and foster greater recognition and belonging for Afro-Latine communities in our collective consciousness, creating an archive that serves as a testament to our ancestry while empowering future generations to embrace their cultural histories. My time as artist-in-residence at Pivot Arts, will allow me to revisit the established imagery thus far and redefine (Traces – Identidad) into a new body of work by incorporating family archives, experimenting with alternative forms of printmaking and mixed media, and using sound and recollection as a tangible form of exercising memory and honoring lineage. Pivot Arts Residency would be a transformative opportunity for me as a growing visual artist. This will be my second artist-in-residence in the entire span of my career and journey as an artist. It will provide me with the space, clarity, and resources to approach my practice in new and experimental ways and it is my hope that it will be one of the many turning points in moving my practice forward in a way that not only fulfills and stays true to my values but pushes me to develop as a multi-disciplinary artist.
Kayla Reefer is an Afro-Panamanian American multi-disciplinary artist based in Chicago, Illinois. Her still imagery primarily nests in the genres of portraiture and documentation through which she explores the varying nuances of identity, intimacy, and community. At the root of her practice is the objective to investigate the circulation, production, and reception of Afro-Latine diasporic people and culture. This intention has allowed her to pose questions, imagine possibilities, and brainstorm solutions concerning the erasure of people whose identities mirror her own. As a photographer, Reefer’s commissioned work has spanned across the genres of photojournalism, music and entertainment, editorial, and commercial campaigns. Throughout her 11 year career, her work has been featured in publications such as TIME Magazine, The New York Times, The FADER, Vice, and Vogue, along with campaigns for Apple, Spotify, and Airbnb. Her work as a DP/cinematographer for experimental short film UNDER BONE (2017), has been selected for film programs and festivals including Toronto Short Film Festival, BlackStar Film Festival, Outfest Fusion LGBT People of Color Film Festival and more.
The Money Tree...
after Amy Krouse Rosenthal.
As a person who believes in Everything, I find myself consistently battling the question of how to keep going, despite the state of the world we find ourselves in. The world, since Amy Krouse Rosenthal’s departure, seems to have taken a nose-dive into negativity/despair/polarity that appears to be harder and harder to rectify. Specifically, the scarcity mindset that capitalism forces us into imbues doubt within all of us that something Good could really be happening. No catches. Just abundance. This project is intended to provide that to people: “just relief, and belief that they could stumble into something good today.”
Mikee Parangalan (she/her) is a Midwest apologist and carpe diem evangelist, writing and creating in Chicago, Illinois. She is often looking at something and figuring out how it can be something else. Her work can be found in hex literary magazine, Milwaukee Avenue Messenger, and her project proof of what? is available on Bottlecap Press. She has worked as a theatre artist with Writer’s Theatre, the neofuturists, and is an ensemble member at Theatre Above the Law.