Vincent Miranda in /digital room/
Note by Guest Juror Dorothy Santos
Miranda’s use of and focus on the stutter must be disambiguated from glitch. The stutter is a rumination on a particular moment. It is a vernacular of the immediate environment that, unlike glitch, emphasizes and elongates the gesture as opposed to breaking down or breaking apart. In constant conversation, Miranda’s sculptural and digital works are an homage to, cultural commentary on, and reflection of his Southern roots. In an age where the GIF has viewers perpetually transfixed by their motion, Miranda has controlled that urge for motion in his viewers, completely slowing the pace down to a bright yet humid instance. We stop, for a moment, to reflect on the drawl, the Lean, and the moments before the Come Up.
Artist Bio
Vincent Miranda is an interdisciplinary artist from South Florida, living and working in San Francisco, California.
Coming from down South, you notice its got a different vibe; this lethargic, slow-moving type of feeling, present in everything from dialect to climate. You know, that Southern drawl. A child of mixed parents, he was always caught between two cultures; between two cultural identities. This lack of identification created a sort of “identity vacuum”; one that was filled by his upbringing in the South. Through sculptural investigations, he aims to explore how his lived experience intersects with topics like Southern hip-hop, the ‘come up’, and how that informs an identity as a young man of color.
A recurring symbol in his work acting as a reference to the region, Lean is a drink made from a mixture of Sprite and Actavis (Promethazine with Codeine). This interest stems from the sonic and affective terrain of Lean in contemporary Southern hip-hop; how a substance is utilized to counter the realities of marginalized individuals. When you enter the space, you’re presented with lackadaisical hanging silicone skins, and walls that seem to be sagging or melting: in a way, everything is Leaning. Creating objects and installations that mirror the affects of this drink, Miranda is able to visually convey what that utilization looks like in a physical realm.
He is also exploring the “come up”; the need to present yourself as having come up out of certain socioeconomic conditions. Jewelry is often used to represent this upward mobility. Down South, we refer to jewelry as ice, water, and glass. He uses these terms as material means to present the gestures upon which the jewelry would typically be displayed.