Conversation Series Fall 2025 Sofa Issues

Letter from the Editors

Second Year Crew: Sarah Luu, Gwen Hoeffgen, Domenic Toliver and Adela Cardona Puerta

One of the things that consistently stands out in our program is how our work is informed by those we surround ourselves by. Each of us comes with a different set of experiences, questions, and personal connections, and those differences shape our practices in ways that make them unmistakably our own. At the same time, we often find ourselves drawn together through shared experiences, interests, and processes.

This issue brings together interviews that follow those threads: the ideas we return to, the places that ground us, and the people who walk beside us. For some, literature became a site of connection—reading as a way of relating to others, or books as companions that open unexpected routes into our work. Others found themselves seeking alternative modes of expression, experimenting with forms that offer new possibilities for communication and understanding. Many contributors reflected on learning through lived experience, letting life itself act as a teacher.

Across several interviews, we also see a reconsideration of the tools we rely on. How can the same tool take on different purposes depending on intention, context, or care? Many conversations touched on the importance of praxis, the effort to align what we practice with what we believe, and to walk the walk and not only talk the talk. Themes of inner awareness, vulnerability, and the willingness to be misunderstood recur as well, along with honest reflections on anger as a meaningful way of navigating the world. These interviews invite us into alternative ways of sensing, thinking, and interpreting what surrounds us.

One of the most prominent themes this term is friendship. Many contributors chose to speak with friends, collaborators, or peers—people who have been present in their lives not only as fellow artists but as confidants and supporters. These conversations highlight what it means to show up for one another, to share resources and experiences, and to grow alongside someone else. The issue reveals how friendships, both longstanding and newly formed, can shape creative practices just as profoundly as any formal study.

Each term, this journal gives us an opportunity to reflect on our practices through the act of conversation. Interviewing—listening, responding, wondering aloud—offers its own form of discovery. While patterns inevitably emerge across issues, each interview remains distinct: its own world, its own rhythm, its own exchange.

We hope you enjoy this fall’s issue of the Social Forms of Art Journal.