Vick Quezada (they/them) is an interdisciplinary artist, explores hybrid forms in Indigenous-Latinx history and the function of these histories in contested lands, primarily in the U.S.-Mexico Border. They work with a variety of mediums: video, performance, sculpture and ceramics. They incorporate found objects (man-made) and natural elements, like dirt, soil, flora, corn and combine them with found objects like bricks, reclaimed trash, chains, cans, and barbed wire.
Quezada’s work explores liberation through an approach that is rooted in queer and Indigenous knowledge, histories, and aesthetics. They draw on an Aztec-Nahuan religious doctrine that affirms a “two spirit” tradition in order to make the Latinx and Indiginous transgender body visible through history, trauma, and pleasure. Quezada categorically is a Rascuache Chicanx artist, one who repurposes and stylizes found objects. Rascuache engineering is not just a skill, it is a lifestyle and a practice of liberation. It is a creative strategy for insurgent survival in the post-apocalyptic settler colonial world. In queering the archaeological, Quezada desire to offer an understanding of gender and sexuality outside of the dominant narratives and create an alternate world of erotic power and joy.
Quezada’s most recently received the prestigious Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship co-sponsored by the Ford Foundation. Their work has been featured in Hyperallergic, BOMB Magazine, The Boston Globe, The New York Times, Art News, Trans Studies Quarterly, and Remezcla. From 2020-21 they served as a Leslie Lohman Museum Fellow. In 2020 Quezada was hand selected from a "large-scale survey" of 40 emerging artists from the US and Puerto Rico to be featured in El Museo del Barrio's groundbreaking, La Trienal.
Quezada has received numerous grants and awards from institutions such as the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, the Artist Relief Grant supported by Americans for the Arts and Creative Capital, and the Massachusetts Cultural Council (NOP). Quezada’s residency includes the Vermont Studio Center and the Liberations Residency at MassMoca. From 2019-20 Quezada was the artist-in-residence at the Latinx Project at NYU where they gave public talks, and workshops. In 2018, Quezada was selected as the University Massachusetts Contemporary Arts -University Massachusetts at Amherst Curatorial Fellow, along with Fred Wilson, who curated the show, 5 Takes On African Art. Quezada holds a BA from the University of Texas at El Paso and an MFA from UMASS Amherst.