Miljohn Ruperto's 'Animal, Vegetable, nor Mineral' at Cantor Arts Center

The Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University presents 'Miljohn Ruperto: Animal, Vegetable, nor Mineral,' an exhibition running from March 12 to September 14, 2026. The show features works that explore the intersection of perception, monstrosity, and extraction. Ruperto's 'Mineral Monsters' (2014) uses parallax to create animated minerals that appear to vibrate, challenging viewers' perceptions. The artist draws on philosopher Georges Canguilhem's argument that monstrosity is a construct of human definitions and projections onto nonhuman matter. A central piece, 'Fathoms (Tartarapelagic)' (2025–26), is a digital simulation of luminous, grotesque creatures generated by AI, based on discoveries in the Clarion-Clipperton Zone in the Pacific Ocean, a region targeted for deep-sea mining. The computational system running the simulation relies on minerals like nickel, cobalt, and copper harvested from that same zone, creating a feedback loop where the monsters materialize from their own extraction. The exhibition is on view at the Cantor Arts Center in Stanford, California.