desktop_tropicália re-imagines aspects of my connection to my own tropical culture in the Philippines in virtual space. In this time of quarantine, much of my connection to the natural world is now mediated through computer screens. desktop_tropicália highlights the dichotomy and contradictions of developing, tropical island nations and the rapid implementation of technological and networked systems through the hyper-modern intimate act of allowing others to view my computer's desktop. desktop_tropicália was created using a number of multimedia processes including code written in JavaScript and C#.

FutureProof: (Chatrooms, Bathhouses, and SRO's), 2021

AI neural network implementation (GPT2 and Char RNN), interactive website

FutureProof is a network of four interactive AI Chatbots that live in the Cloud: https://mhr1235.github.io/future_proof/

The four bots are:

swardspeak-bot : trained on social media posts in swardspeak (salitang beki): https://mhr1235.github.io/chatbot1/

leather-bot: trained on gay leather datasets: https://mhr1235.github.io/chatbot2/

manong-bot: trained on dialogue sets from archival I-hotel interviews: https://mhr1235.github.io/chatbot3/

showgirl-bot: trained on dialogue sets from SOMA cabaret performers: https://mhr1235.github.io/chatbot4/

Together the bots speak to and from a specific moment of convergent queer and FilipinX San Francisco SOMA communities and (his)stories. FutureProof makes it possible to text chat with the bots live on the web. *The Yerba Buena exhibition also presents offline video footage of the bot's conversation on monitors and projected on the museum exterior.