Interdisciplinary artist Gala Porras-Kim, who completed both a B.A. and an M.A. at UCLA, won a prestigious MacArthur Fellowship last year.
UCLA International Institute, May 26, 2026 — Gala Porras-Kim, an international interdisciplinary artist who lives between Los Angeles and London and has had solo exhibitions across the world, will be the speaker at the UCLA International Institute commencement ceremony in Royce Hall on Saturday, June 13, 2026, at 6:30 p.m.
Porras-Kim was already a global citizen when she arrived in Los Angeles at the age of 12. The child of a Colombian father and a South Korean mother, she lived on the UCLA campus for many years while her mother earned a Ph.D. in Spanish-language literature.
“I knew at a young age I wanted to make art, but I wanted the subject to be somewhere in Latin America because, being here as an immigrant, I wanted to make work that would take me back,” said Porras-Kim in an interview with the UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture in 2013.
As a middle- and high-schooler, she became very familiar with the collections of the UCLA Library and Music Library, as well as those of the Fowler and Hammer museums. She has since been featured in exhibitions for these museums as a professional artist. She was one of many individual artists featured in “Made in L.A 2016: a, the, though, only” at the Hammer and had a solo exhibition, “The weight of the patina of time,” at the Fowler in 2023. Both exhibitions featured speculative reconstructions of unidentified objects in the Fowler collection, together with the repurposing of such objects in new artworks.
Porras-Kim’s principal focus as an artist is the relationships that shape how we understand historical material, how such materials are preserved and framed by museums, and how these frameworks and the stories we tell about the objects change over time. All of her work is deeply rooted in research, which lays the foundation for her ideas for an exhibition. The MacArthur Foundation has noted about her work, “Her research-intensive practice focuses on objects and forms of knowledge that have been separated from their original contexts.”
“I think people should create their own relationships to this historical material so that it still becomes relevant to the world and not just stuck in the past as something that we inherit — but that we might be able to create our own world with that material as well,” said Porras-Kim to UCLA Newsroom.
From UCLA to professional artist
After earning a B.A. in art at UCLA in 2007, Porras-Kim completed an M.A. in fine arts at the California Institute of the Arts in 2009, followed by an M.A. in Latin American studies in 2012.
Speaking about her M.A. thesis, UCLA historian and history department chair Kevin Terraciano said, “For a final project, she examined a tradition of whistling among the Zapotecs of Oaxaca as a form of nonverbal communication. She submitted an essay, along with an LP recording of examples, and she did the artwork for the album cover. I have it in my office — it’s a work of art. I have followed her success as an artist with admiration.” (See UCLA Newsroom article.)
The roster of her solo exhibitions in museums worldwide — together with the awards and research fellowships she has received from arts-related organizations, philanthropic foundations and museums — reflect the recognition and esteem that Porras-Kim has earned in the art world.
Among the museums that have hosted her exhibitions are the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art and the Leeum Museum of Art, South Korea; Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico City; Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo, Seville; Gasworks, London; Kunsthalle Bern, Switzerland; Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh; Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver; Museum of Contemporary Arts, Cleveland; Contemporary Art Museum, St. Louis; and Kadist (an international contemporary arts organization) and Amant (a center for contemporary art) in New York.
Her work has also been featured in multiple city biennales (including Venice, Gwangju, São Paulo, Singapore, Diriyah and Liverpool) and is part of the public collections of such museums as MoMA and the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Brooklyn Museum; Hammer Museum, LACMA and MOCA, Los Angeles; MCA Chicago; DePaul Art Museum; Dallas Museum of Art; Seoul Museum of Art, Korea; FRAC Pays de la Loire, France; and the Tate Modern.
Porras-Kim has received awards from, among others, United States Artists, Heinz Foundation, American Academy of Arts and Letters and Creative Capital for Artists, and has conducted research as a fellow at Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Studies at Harvard University (2019), artist-in-residence at the Getty Research Institute (2020–22), resident artist at the American Academy (2025) and a fellow at the Museo delle Civiltà (2026), both in Rome.
Last fall, Porras-Kim was one of only 22 people (and one of two UCLA alumnae) to receive a MacArthur Fellowship, also known as a “genius grant.” The fellowship recognizes “extraordinarily creative individuals with a track record of excellence in a field of scholarship or area of practice, who demonstrate the ability to impact society in significant and beneficial ways through their pioneering work or the rigor of their contributions.” The honor comes with a stipend of $800,00 over five years, which recipients may use at their discretion.
Returning to UCLA is always a homecoming for this alumna. The International Institute looks forward to hosting Gala Porras-Kim and hearing her message for our Class of 2026.
See MacArthur Foundation video about Porras-Kim.
See many works created by Porras-Kim in a photo collection created by Commonwealth and Council, a gallery in Koreatown, Los Angeles.
Published: Tuesday, May 26, 2026
