08/12/2026
ANNOUNCING THE 2026 SOSAA RECIPIENTS!
We are pleased to announce that Lisa Gotto has received a SOSAA grant this year for her project, ‘Ecologies of Fire and Disability: A Seasonal Field Study.’
Lisa is a mother, artist, scientist, and explorer who recently retired from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, where she worked as a geologist and environmental justice community engagement specialist. After more than 20 years as an environmental professional, she now explores the intersections of care, creativity, and connection.
‘Ecologies of Fire and Disability’ is an immersive, arts-based field study exploring the relationships between a fire-adapted prairie ecosystem and disabled lived experience. Through seasonal fieldwork, Lisa will consider how cycles of dormancy, disturbance, regeneration, and adaptation shape both prairie ecologies and disabled ways of navigating change over time.
Treating disabled bodyminds and the ecological environments in which they exist as interconnected participants in the research process, Lisa will use sensory observation, embodied movement, creative writing, and site-specific materials to explore alternative understandings of survival, access, temporality, and interdependence.
The project will culminate in a community exhibition combining essays, poetry, audio work, and eco-collage, inviting others to experience and explore the connections that emerge from the study.
Congratulations, Fossils!! ! We look forward to seeing where this exploration leads.