Alessia Petrolito

School of the Art Institute of Chicago · Department of Visual and Critical Studies

This presentation title, “The Shape of the Word”, is a word pun (Gioco di parole) between the word “shape” being a form and the term “word” being an alternative to the body. Over the course of this dialogue, Devi and I will merge our interest in arts and storytelling to narrate the adopted body we are familiar with... What can a body tell of a body...

The analysis of adoptees' virtual communities through social media lenses / Virtual communities are originated by a combination of the two; where adoption is both a trigger event and a passion.

Reflections on hypersexualization: reactions to racial 'mixture' and perceived ethnical contrast with references to artists' work on adoptive fathers and daughters images. English translation of Italian article from 2017 available at https://arpadoptic.com/2017/03/10/papa-ed-io-non-possiamo-sederci-o-camminare-insieme/

The proposal exhibition built upon a previous project, Black but Italian, from 2015 and 2016, in which I unknowingly followed the “lifelogging trend” and tested my DNA genealogy for regional ancestry. Longing to Match focuses on imperceptible traits shown in DNA test results (for example mine were tracing me back to Scandinavia, England, Wales S-W...

Originally, "The Eye-Catcher" was the title for an exhibition proposal. The term references the state of “being looked at,” “stared” or "noted" such as “capturing someone’s attention.” All the thinking sparkled from a lifetime encounter with a couple of friends of ours, us being Italians (and slightly American), and them being Dutch and American....

A multitude of artists writers and performers flourished online, and festivals exhibitions and publications duplicated with them. I consider this to be a worldwide phenomenon in which adoptees are self-translating authors, and thus, I am asking you, what could it be more interesting to study?

Search vs Research - A comparison between artistic research and search for identity and origins: adoptee artists and adult adoptees use arts to understand and develop the Self.

Dislocata-focuses on the perception of discomfort and the obsession with Return.

Chewing Ambiguity events - sendoutposter

My adoption experience has always been the foundation of my artistic practice, for I believe the proliferation of adult adoptees’ visual arts explorations (film, documentary, photography, writing etc.) to be a visual phenomenon that deserves an artistic academic research wing in the adoption literature.

Based on my living experience as a transracial international adoptee born in the U.S. who grew up in Italy, and has now moved back to the birth country, this paper establishes and explores the adoptic state: the interstitial state/space between the native and the receiving country in which most international adoptees inhabit.