Miguel Monroy Melgoza
As a child one of the games that I liked best was to name something many times until it lost its meaning.
Usually I played with words such as bank, horse or others that immediately brought to mind a specific image or feeling. I liked to see how that image would dissolve through the repetition of the word. At some point the process became irreversible and the words’ meaning escaped, such as water pours through the hands. At the end of the process, I was brought face to face with an absolute unknown word.
Institutional conventions of modern life that interest me derive from daily social interactions. They emerge to satisfy specific needs: the circulation of money, surveillance of spaces, behavioral modification through signage and the valuation of Art. My interest is to set them free from their designated function. In a world where everything has a purpose, the impossibility of the original role of an object questions its presence and provokes its liberation. I am interested in showing that the form and the function of these systems are not the original principles that provide them with a meaning; instead it is a renewed social effort to avoid the total irruption of contingency. As I am counteracting these dynamics I realize that I am dealing with political concerns that indicate the ideology within our own daily circumstance. The goal in my work is to show the presence of the constant machinery that produces the ideology that surrounds us.
miguelmonroy.net • @miguelmonroym
Traffic signs (This is not), 2020. Digital print, 24 x 36 in.
Traffic signs (Signs not), 2020. Digital print, 24 x 36 in.
Traffic signs (Warning), 2020. Digital print, 24 x 36 in.
Traffic signs (Pay not attention), 2020. Digital print, 36 x 64 in.
Traffic signs (Forbidden), 2020. Digital print, 36 x 64 in.
Hoover Tower Concert, 2020. 4 channel video installation. Duration: 3 min 15 sec. Sound: 5.1 surround sound.
Fibonacci Studio, 2020. Installation, variable measurement.
Miguel Monroy critiques the ways that institutions exert control over people through his conceptual work. From absurd rules and street signs to protest songs, his sculptures and videos disrupt the ways in which systems act upon us. He deftly uses technology to reveal slippages, questioning privileged perspectives enforcing oppression on it’s people. He creates awareness and opens a space of critical institutional rejection.
—Terry Berlier, Associate Professor, Art Practice
Selfie (Kyoto), 2020. Digital print, velum paper, 18x24 in.
Selfie (South Africa), 2020. Digital print, velum paper, 18x24 in.
Selfie (South Africa), 2020. Digital print, velum paper, 18x24 in.
Selfie (Oviedo), 2020. Digital print, velum paper, 18x24 in.
Selfie (Kyoto), 2020. Digital print, velum paper, 18x24 in.
Selfie series, 2020. Installation view.
Hoover Tower renovation project, 2018. Cyanotype.
Insertions in economic circuits, 2019. Digital print, 9x2.3 ft.
Street View Selfie, 2020. Website, streetviewselfie.online.
Miguel Monroy (b. Mexico City, Mexico) critiques the ways that institutions exert control over people through his conceptual work. From absurd rules and street signs to protest songs, his sculptures and videos disrupt the ways in which systems act upon us. He deftly uses technology to reveal slippages, questioning privileged perspectives enforcing oppression on it’s people. He creates awareness and opens a space of critical institutional rejection.