In his artistic work, Derzu Campos (1980, Mexico) imagines post-apocalyptic scenarios through a mixture of science fiction and underground culture. Using a variety of media - video, installation, graphic work, sound and performance - Derzu Campos presents a static world dominated by the fear of collapse: in perpetual paralysis by endless repetition - but like a living cancer in a moment of increasingly accelerated autophagy - the human project (Society, Culture, Information, Politics) begins to fade and melt along the edges, freeing the future of its temporal anchor, and liquefying into a toxic gunk where the vestiges of the past that tormented History are finally redeemed. A Brutalist building collapses as liquid multi-coloured circuits flow across multiple screens; and the windows show celebrities smiling; guns firing; memes flashing; logos shining, heads rolling; anger in the faces of the rioters, beautiful paintings, burqas and balaclavas, eastern eyes, corporate suits, glowing brands.
Derzu Campos received his MFA from Goldsmiths, University of London in 2015. Recent projects and exhibitions include La nube y la tempestad at Galería Breve, in Mexico City; Los Desposeídos (The Dispossessed), commissioned for BIENALSUR (International Biennial of Contemporary Art of South America); Signs Preceding The End of the World at La_Capsula and Kunstraum Walcherturm in Zürich; De Regreso a la Isla at Fundació Palma Espai d’art, in Palma de Mallorca; and Between 9:00 pm and Home, at Chalton Gallery, London. Publications include A Return to the Island (CDMX: Secretaría de Cultura, FONCA, y Goldmiths University of London); De Regreso a la Isla (Mallorca: Casal Solleric); 200 Best Illustrators Worldwide 2011-12 (Viena: Lürzer’s Archive). Awards and distinctions include: Sistema Nacional de Creadores de Arte (2020-2023); Beca Jóvenes Creadores (2010-2011), both from FONCA (National Fund for Culture and the Arts, Mexico); Deutsche Bank Award for Creative Enterprises (2015, nomination); and Goldsmiths Enterprise Award (2015) from Goldsmiths, University of London. Prominent academic experience includes head of the Graphic Communication Design BA’s Illustration department in the faculty of Sciences and Arts for Design (CyAD) at Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana (2017-2z020) and the Audiovisual Projects Workshop of the MA in Photography and Visual Studies of Centro ADM, both in Mexico City.
CV
Artist Statement
The promise of what is yet to come, by Helena Lugo