Katie Vota (she/they, b. 1987, Cincinnati, OH) is a Chicago-based artist and educator seeking to (re)evaluate our relationships with materiality, community, and environment through the medium of tapestry re-imagined in the digital age. Her woven landscapes and dreamscapes site the glitch in the woven matrix as a site for rupture, for change—a generative space for the creation of new futures.

Vota received her BFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art (2010) and a Studio MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2015). She was awarded a US Student Fulbright Grant (’11-’12) to study traditions of Andean Back-strap Weaving and Natural Dyeing in Cusco, Peru, with the Center for Traditional Textiles of Cusco.

Vota has exhibited in numerous solo and juried exhibitions, at venues including Threewalls (Chicago, IL), Mu Gallery (Chicago, IL), Leslie Wolfe Gallery (Chicago, IL), The Krasl Art Center (St. Joseph, MI), The Indianapolis Art Center (Indianapolis, IN), and Ignition Projects (Chicago, IL). She is a Lenore Tawney Foundation Scholar, a Chicago DCASE grantee, and has participated in residencies such as Praxis Fiber Workshop’s Digital Weaving Lab Residency, Hyde Park Art Center’s “Center Program” for New Works development, CAC Field Work Residency, Chicago Art Department’s “On Mending” think tank, and Crosshatch in Traverse City, MI.

Headshot credit: Jonathan Michael Castillo (@joncastillophoto)

Image: Katie Vota, The Blackened Tide is not Recognized by the Sky, 2025, Echo woven iridescent tapestry, with tencel, wool, steel,  204″ x 102″ x 22”