Redshift & Portalmetal
micha cárdenas created the online, interactive game Redshift & Portalmetal in 2015 to trace colonization, the politics of settlers and settlement, migration, and climate change. The story uses space travel as a lens through which to understand the experience of migration and settlement for a trans woman of color. The game “honors the native peoples of the Anishnabe, Mississauga, New Credit and Grassy Narrows territories, where cárdenas was a visitor from 2014-2015, and supports their struggle against the murder and disappearance of native women, as well as against mercury poisoning, logging and other destructive practices that harm them and their homelands.”* This game is focused on resurgence and is extended through live performance and hands-on creative workshops. cárdenas' ongoing practice is centered on safety technologies for trans people of color, who face shockingly high rates of violence, and interactive media design.
cárdenas designed the interaction, wrote the text, performed the movement, and coordinated the filming in Los Angeles and Toronto. The project is built with HTML5 video, CSS and Javascript, using the Scalar e-publishing platform.
*from Redshift & Portalmetal website
Redshift & Portalmetal, micha cardenas, 2015.
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micha cárdenas works with virtual reality, science fiction, wearable electronics, bioart, fashion design, performance, creative coding, and writing, most recently through Local Autonomy Networks, Redshift and Portalmetal, and Hold Your Boundaries.com. Her practice and research is focused on the survival and health of trans women of color in order to create futures of health for all people who do not fit into traditional representations of binary gender.
Her solo and collaborative artworks and publications have been shared in museums, galleries, biennials, keynotes, journals, books, community and public spaces around the world. A first generation Colombian American, cárdenas holds a PhD from the University of Southern California in Media Arts + Practice, an MFA from the University of California, San Diego, an MA in Communication from the European Graduate School and a BS in Computer Science from Florida International University. She is currently Assistant Professor of Art & Design: Games + Playable Media at the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Find out more information at michacardenas.org and twitter.
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