For younger generations, the phone has become the most sacred object. Neveah Marquez debuted "000000" at SoMad's pre-construction celebration, ahead of renovations on our new building. The work treats the phone as a relic: heavily guarded, worshipped, and holding intimate images, private conversations, and hidden secrets.
In conversation with performances such as Yoko Ono's Cut Piece and Marina Abramović's Rhythm 0, the performance posed the question, "Is a desecration of the digital avatar just as aggressive as a violation of the corporeal?" Nothing was censored. 000000 was the password.
This was Neveah Marquez's first performance since publicly announcing her transition. In the spirit of the exhibition's excavation of vulnerability as part of sacredness, she was nearly nude, except for her black panties and black Prada heels.
Her body was strapped to a metal cross built from a deconstructed window guard. Her unlocked phone rested over her chest. Two TV monitors beside her mirrored the phone's screen, adding a layer of surveillance within the audience
This piece is part of Neveah's solo show "SAGRADX" at the Riverside Art Museum from September 5, 2026 – January 31, 2027.
PRESS
000000 by Neveah Marquez
About Neveah Marquez
Neveah Marquez is a transgender Mexican-American artist working at the intersections of participatory practice, Queer world-making and Chicanx spatial politics. Her art is camp, whimsical and poignantly grounded in the beauty of everyday life.
She creates magical paintings, durational performances and ephemeral installations that transform private sanctuary into collective ritual. Her work is a practice of metabolizing traditional Latinx cultural frameworks, living with bipolar disorder, and claiming space as a Queer person.
Marquez earned a Bachelor of Arts from the University of California. Her work has since appeared in group exhibitions at the Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art and Culture and the Delaware Contemporary, and in 2024 they co-curated Desde Los Cielos at the Cheech, bringing together fifteen Inland Empire artists working with ideas of alienness and belonging.
She has a fundamental philosophy that art should be something you live in.
Event Photos
