Mateo "Máte" Vargas (b. 1993) is a Mexican filmmaker, photographer, writer, and visual artist.
Their multimedia work focuses on intersections and fractures of borders, land, history, Indigenous cultures and diaspora under the legacies of colonialism and capitalism. They currently reside and work on occupied Kumeyaay land (Tijuana/San Diego).
Their still and moving image work has screened and exhibited in festivals and galleries in Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia, Cuba, Peru, South Africa, Russia, China, Vietnam, India, Japan, Argentina, Greece, Germany, Italy, Portugal, France, Spain, England, Australia, and the U.S.
Their documentary on water pollution and environmental contamination in the State of Mexico, Aguas Negras (2021), has screened at the New York Latino Film Festival, Philadelphia Latino Film Festival, Africa Human Rights Film Festival in Johannesburg, San Antonio CineFestival, Moscow International Experimental Film Festival, Festival Fotogenia at UNAM, and Suncine Environmental Film Festival on Canal Once public television in Mexico City.
Aguas Negras details the legacy of decades of neoliberal policies in the State of Mexico. The documentary examines the urbanization and pollution of the Rio Cuautitlán and the effect it has had on three different generations of the filmmaker’s family living in Cuautitlán Izcalli, a city identified as having the highest perception of insecurity in the State of Mexico.
Their follow-up work Algún día caerá (2022) focuses on the farthest extremes of the U.S.-Mexico border, from the Rio Bravo to the Pacific Ocean. The work screened as part of a public video art installation during documenta fifteen in Kassel, Germany, and as part of a group exhibition at ABM Confecciones Space in Madrid, Spain as well as part of an exhibition at SoMad NYC gallery in New York City.
Algún día caerá also screened at Festival Internacional de Cine de Los Cabos, Saigon Experimental Film Festival, Beijing International Short Film Festival, San Diego Latino Film Festival, San Antonio CineFestival, and Transcinema Festival Internacional de Cine in Lima, Peru. The film won the Adriana and Dolores Ehlers award for Best Short Documentary at the Festival Internacional de Cine Silente Mexico in Puebla.
Their third major work, Cruces (2024), centers on a night of migratory beach crossings in Tijuana. Cruces had its Latin American premiere at Al Este Festival Internacional de Cine in Lima, Peru, its Mexican premiere at Tijuana Vertical Film Festival and its Asian premiere at Badnām Film Festival in Bangalore, India. Cruces also screened as a video installation in a group exhibition at Centro Cultural de la Raza in San Diego, California and Woo Studios in Barrio Logan.
Their most recent work, The hour of liberation is near (2025), screened in an exhibition as part of Enero Zapatista, a series of politically and culturally grounded events on the unceded lands of the Kumeyaay, Cahuilla, Cupeño, and Payómkawichum (Luiseño) peoples commemorating the Indigenous Zapatista uprising of January 1994 by the EZLN in Chiapas. The film has also screened at the Nogales International Film Festival and the Latino & Native American Film Festival (LANAFF). The film won the Best California Short Film award at the California International Film Festival in Tijuana, Baja California.
