KST Alloy Studios – 5530 Penn Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15206
Tuesday, October 6 from 6-8pm
Free, Open to the public
Join us on Tuesday, October 6, 2026 to welcome our tenth Pedantic cohort. The Pedantic Residents will be giving brief presentations on their backgrounds and their practices.
The Pedantic Arts residency is a month-long cross-disciplinary program. We’ve invited three residents whose practices span visual art, curating, and writing to explore the city of Pittsburgh and its creative communities.
We’re looking forward to welcoming Min Liao (Visual Artist), Veronica Sesana Grajales (Curator), and Dr. Gaila Sims (Writer).
This is a free event, and RSVP is requested to attend. To RSVP, please fill out the brief form below. Registration will also be available at the door. Free drinks and food will be provided at the event.
Born in Taiwan and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area, Min Liao (she/her) is a private chef and culinary/hospitality consultant based in New York City. Her multidisciplinary career path has included public health education, community nutrition, print media, corporate grocery, and the nonprofit arts ecosystem. Her work often intersects at the nexus of care, communications, and cultural impact.
Min holds a master’s degree in Food Studies from New York University, and was the recipient of the Jean-Louis Palladin Grant from the James Beard Foundation in 2019. Her food writing has been published in the national Best Food Writing anthologies, and she’s a contributing writer for Alta Journal. In 2025, she was the first culinary artist-in-residence at Central Oregon’s Pine Meadow Ranch Center for Arts & Agriculture as well as The Nicholson Project in Washington DC, where she engaged in social practice that examined the tensions and hierarchies between service, art, invisible labor, and cultural production.
Veronica Sesana Grajales (she/her) is an independent curator specializing in modern and contemporary Latin American and Latinx art. Born in Bogotá, Colombia, she holds an MA in Modern and Contemporary Art History, Theory, and Criticism from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2017). Her curatorial research focuses on fostering dialogues across the Global South, promoting the work of emerging artists, and organizing thought-provoking exhibitions that engage with contemporary sociopolitical issues. Over her decade-long career, Veronica has held curatorial positions at prominent institutions, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (2017–2024), Sullivan Galleries (2016–2017), the Art Institute of Chicago (2016), and the Cisneros Fontanals Art Foundation (2014). As an independent curator, her recent exhibition projects include Read Me at Mahara & Co. in Miami, FL (2026), Mayaimi at The Studios of Key West (2026), and Fragmentos de un sueño que yo también soñé (Fragments of a Dream I Also Dreamed) at Art League Houston (2025). In addition to her independent curatorial practice, she has served as a curatorial consultant for platforms like Pinta Miami and Galería La Cometa. In 2025, Veronica founded Eclectico Art Advisory, where her extensive background organizing exhibitions and collaborating with artists informs a research-driven, curatorial approach to collecting.
Dr. Gaila Sims (she/her) is the Assistant Curator of History at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. Originally from Riverside, California, she received her BA in History and African American Studies from Oberlin College and her MA and PhD in American Studies from the University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Sims has held positions at several museums, archives, and cultural institutions, including the George Washington Carver Museum and Cultural Center, the Bullock Texas State History Museum, the Harry Ransom Center, and the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. From 2022-2025, she served as the inaugural Curator of African American History at the Fredericksburg Area Museum in Fredericksburg, Virginia.