Vian Sora and James Glisson, SBMA Chief Curator, will have a conversation about her artwork and her turn in 2017 to the abstract painting for which she has become so well known. She grew up in Baghdad, Iraq in a family of art dealers and auctioneers at the center of the Iraqi artworld but then lived through two American invasions and the Insurgency. While her paintings are ultimately life affirming and even joyous with buoyant colors, they also contain fragments of these difficult experiences as well as her adjustment to life in the United States where she has lived since 2006.

Vian Sora is the subject of an upcoming solo exhibition Vian Sora: Outerworlds, co-organized by SBMA, Asia Society Texas and Speed Art Museum. Sora has gained an international following with her abstract paintings with recent solo shows at David Nolan Gallery, New York, and Luis de Jesus Gallery, Los Angeles, and her work is held by many museums including SBMA, Baltimore Museum of Art, Speed Museum, Ministry of Culture Contemporary Collection, Baghdad, Iraq; and Dar El Cid Museum, Kuwait City, Kuwait.