Shey 'Ri Acu' Rivera Ríos
Tierra Futura:
Submerged Archives of Boricua Futurity
I use multiple artistic mediums to create a mejunje (mix) where magical realism and science fiction become doors to decolonial futures. My preference leans toward performance and installation, animated collages, drawing over photographs, writing and storytelling across mediums. My creative practice is a tool to confront colonization and it gains strength from my lived experience and history of the island of Borikén (Puerto Rico), where I was born and raised. My creative practice has become my ancestral superpower, a way of merging past-present-future to uncover wisdom harnessed across time. It’s my way of challenging colonialism and creating spaces and stories of queer joy, liberation, imagination, and self-determination in the face of U.S. imperialism.
Mano de Obra. Digital landscape photograph print intervened with gold ink. 2022.
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Cinder block altar prototypes. See caption in image.
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cinder block at edge of water video still. see caption in image.
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Plátano Ancestors Room 2. Animated video collage or animated gif. 2023.
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No Tiene Casa. Animated video collage or animated gif. Intervened photo by Jack Delano, collage by Shey Rivera Ríos.
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Photographic map of Puerto Rico by William Armstrong.
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Jíbaro, sugar cane worker photograph by Jack Delano.
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EXHIBITION IMAGES