Miguel González

Miguel González was born in Querétaro, Querétaro, and currently lives in Monterrey, Nuevo León. His practice to date has focused on drawing and painting. His work is narrative, though it often includes moments where line and color break away from their symbolic function and recover an abstract quality. The themes and ideas vary over time, but his interest in everyday life, spatial representation, and the intersections between representation and Monterrey’s cultural identity remains constant.

Malas Mañas brings together visual chronicles inspired by the streets and culture of northeastern Mexico—images that aim to frame certain atmospheres: a darkened street corner, the roar of a tricked-out black truck, the rancid air drifting from factories and rusted pipes, the red glow of a traffic light, or a 15-peso dance with a bar girl in a damp dive at an ungodly hour.

Through sensitive cartographies, Miguel builds a cultural narrative of the place he inhabits, incorporating materials found in the same environment—pieces of wood that become frames, ashes turned into pigment, and cement slabs transformed into canvases.

—Daniela Elbahara