Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley (English, b. 1995) creates interactive video games, animation, sound, and performance that archive Black Trans experience. Working predominantly in game engines, the artist creates immersive installations that ask audiences to make choices determining whether they protect or endanger Black Trans characters. Brathwaite-Shirley was born in London and lives and works between London and Berlin.
Brathwaite-Shirley graduated from the Slade School of Fine Art in London in 2019, having already presented solo performances at venues including Raven Row and the Barbican. In 2020 the Science Gallery in London commissioned Black Trans Archive, a game-based work created from interviews with twelve Black Trans people. The following year, “SHE KEEPS ME DAMN ALIVE” at arebyte Gallery extended earlier web-based archiving projects into a point-and-shoot arcade game that asks players to protect the game's protagonist across three levels: water, city and dungeon.
