Latham Zearfoss Evokes Selfhood And Transformation Through Art

Photo: Latham Zearfoss, Chicago-based multidisciplinary artist and activist, reflects on identity, connection, and transformation in their practice. Photo by Leondar Suryajaya 

Exploring Identity And Connection Through Multidisciplinary Practice

Latham Zearfoss blends media, activism, and connection to explore identity, collective action, and transformation through soft borders, queer liberation, and poetic, cinematic experiences.

Latham Zearfoss is a rare kind of artist, one whose practice transcends the walls of the studio and the confines of the gallery space. Their work is a study in connection—connection to self, to community, and to the complicated terrain of our collective humanity. A true interdisciplinary visionary, Latham’s practice draws upon the power of time-based media, soundscapes, and sculptural installations to explore identity, selfhood, and the often ambiguous boundaries that define and unite us. Their art is less about providing answers and more about holding space for questions—a lived inquiry into the contradictions, tensions, and intersections that shape our world.

It is nearly impossible to discuss Latham’s work without noting their commitment to collective action and social transformation. From organizing queer dance spaces that celebrate joy and movement, to fostering critical dialogues around allyship, Latham’s projects are as much about activating community as they are about personal expression. Their ability to weave art with activism speaks to a profound generosity of spirit, an unshakeable belief in the power of connection to heal, challenge, and transform.

In this issue, Latham reflects on the fluid interplay between individual creativity and collective effort. They invite us into their world—a world where “soft borders” blur distinction, where identity is celebrated as both a political effect and a space for poetry. With cinematic precision and physical tactility, their body of work encourages audiences to not only look but to feel, question, and reimagine. It is a practice grounded not just in aesthetics, but in the urgent need to expand our possibilities for understanding and empathy. This interview is a glimpse into their dazzling, deeply thoughtful practice, one that leaves us inspired to reckon with our own notions of self and community.

Latham Zearfoss masterfully bridges art and activism, creating transformative, thought-provoking work that invites introspection and fosters empathy across diverse audiences.

How do your personal experiences with selfhood and otherness shape your artistic process and the works you create?

One thing I’m usually trying to do in my creative work is to make space for the hard lines between us to really blur. For a bit of trouble and play. And to tease out some of the tensions I see and relate to in my own life. I’ve always found identity both exhilarating and exahusted, liberating and limiting. As social and empathetic beings, we are also deeply curious about each other but bound up by the social mores that discourage open engagement and inquisitiveness around identity. It can be painful. As a community organizer and activist thinking about queer liberation, feminist praxis, and anti-racism, I also believe we have to create space for our identities to be legible, humanized and understood. Of equal importance, though, is to insisted on the possibilities of poetry, because I think this is the space where are able to transform. 

“One thing I’m usually trying to do in my creative work is to make space for the hard lines between us to really blur.” – Latham Zearfoss

Collaboration seems central to your work. How do you navigate the balance between individual expression and collective input in your projects?

I remember attending a workshop with the playwright Young Jean Lee that was centered around collaboration. She very wisely stated something to the effect that within collaborative contexts, no idea should be precious. There is always a better one. Meaning, if the collective cannot stand behind what expressions are emerging in a collective project, then the work needs to shift in response. And it will, ultimately, be better for it. I think this is really fundamentally true, and it’s the exciting part of collaboration. Collaboration insists on bringing your full self to the conversation, while simultaneously releasing control of where it will lead.

Your artist’s statement mentions that identity is a “cumulative, political effect.” How do you convey this idea through the media you work with, such as time-based images or soundscapes?

Some of the most clarifying moments of self-actualization come about in collective action. For example, I think many people are currently being transformed by the climate crisis, by the rise of fascism, by these (hopefully) last gasps of colonialism and white supremacy. I think these moments of clarification – who you are, what you mean to others, your station – are incredibly definitive. At the same time, there are lesser – or at least less bombastic – moments that also contribute to who we are and how we see ourselves. These smaller moments are conversations, media diets, cultural practices, interpretative belief systems, weird shit we go through, medical histories, or possibly just innate impulses. I love the contradictions that emerge as we live our lives and try to understand ourselves, and build family and community around that understanding. I try to employ disruptions and metamorphoses in my video and sound works. I think of these works as cinematic, and I think cinema is uniquely suited to explore the relational nature of self-actualization because it is by its nature propulsive and evolutionary. Even in abstraction, cinema moves through your body and creates a visceral response. The audience is receiving and reacting and making meaning in real time, and this feels very much like the experience of living. 

How do the concepts of “soft borders” and “queer iterations of the not-noticed” play out in your pieces, and how do you invite viewers to engage with these ideas?

In my sculptural practice, I think a lot about choreography. How will the art objects I make interact with the space of the exhibition, and how does the audience move among the two? When I work in an installation format, I tend to create works that demarcate space, and clearly lay out perspectives (this side, that side) which cannot be inhabited in the same moment. The crux of these works are lines or forms that are soft to the touch, translucent, or emanating light or sound. They invite penetration. This is what I mean by “soft borders.” 

I’m often working with familiar, somewhat organic materials like paper boxes, seeds, plants, fruits, wax, wood, etc. The quotidian nature of the objects is challenged when they undergo transformations of color, context, and curation. In the fine art exhibition context, they are elevated for deeper scrutiny, yielding new meanings while culling their original evocations as well.  

You’ve been involved in social projects like Chances Dances and Open Engagement. How does your work in these spaces influence or complement your studio practice?

As a deeply collaborative maker, I think my penchant for social projects and community organizing is an asset. However, I think the main way they complement one another for me in practical terms is vis-a-vis their difference. I appreciate how I can manifest my core values differently inside social uplift work versus creative inquiry type work. Through collective projects, I tend to lose bandwidth around organizing consensus. In my art practice, I get to make decisions independently or hierarchically at the top. And I don’t have to be coherent in the same way. But after long or depleting stretches of productivity, I crave input and connection from beyond my own internal world. 

You’ve exhibited and performed both nationally and internationally. How does the reception of your work differ across these diverse cultural contexts, and what have you learned from these experiences?

Different cultural contexts offer us humility, in a way I find unendingly valuable. Even if you arrive there by sticking your foot in your mouth, which will happen. I was lucky to do a residency in Aotearoa / New Zealand about 6 years ago now, and while there I was really deep into a lot of reflection and research around whiteness and its relationship to white supremacy. I was focusing on my own experiences, in the U.S. context, but was very energized by seemingly similar conversations happening around Wellington at the time. While there, I led a talk one night around my thinking and the stateside activism around racial justice I’d been doing. Long story short: it kind of went off the rails. I think I failed to fully understand how to facilitate the space so that it felt both safe and transformative. In my wildest dreams, the event would have had the potential to be healing. But it was the opposite and activated some harmful energies that got out of hand. Looking back, I see this was too big and painful of a topic for me – an outsider – to facilitate as a casual drop-in dialogue. It was a good reminder that there is great power in simply being a guest, and remaining humble and curious and mindful in the presence of your hosts.

REVIEW

Latham Zearfoss’s Third Space, on view at the Arts Club of Chicago, bridges nature and urbanity through a thought-provoking installation. Featuring vibrant red logs angled dynamically, the piece transforms raw organic textures into bold, artificial interventions. Set in a serene courtyard with trees, gravel, and modern architecture, the artwork engages in a dialogue between natural and constructed elements. The intense red color draws attention while maintaining harmony with its surroundings. Third Space invites reflection on boundaries, coexistence, and transformation, showcasing Zearfoss’s skill in creating spaces for introspection and connection.